Dead Reign

by T. A. Pratt

  Suddenly Death was beside him, wrenching the shotgun from Rondeau’s hands and flinging it aside. Death had one hand on Rondeau’s shoulder, the other on his thigh, and Rondeau had the feeling the guy could just flat rip him in half with the merest twitch of his muscle. He wanted to pee himself. Fucking treacherous body didn’t have the courage of his mind’s convictions. “Perhaps you can’t die,” Death purred. “But you can suffer, yes? Or would you rather pledge yourself to my service?”

  “Yeah.” Rondeau’s throat was suddenly dry. “You make a compelling argument. Count me in. But, ah, I’m kind of embarrassed to do it in front of Ayres. Do you think, do you mind, would it be okay if I just like…whispered it in your ear?”

  “Of course,” Death said. “I am a reasonable master.” He bowed his head.

  Rondeau leaned forward. He put his lips so close to Death’s ear that he could have kissed him. Rondeau opened his mouth.

  Then he Cursed.

  Ayres gaped as Death flew backward, as if thrown from a horse, and bounced off the wall. Rondeau—who, a moment before, had been at the god’s mercy—wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, making a face like he’d tasted something awful. Booth rushed at him, pulling a knife he’d gotten from who knows where, and Rondeau made a terrible noise, something like a word, but this was a word that made the building’s foundations—perhaps the very foundations of the Earth—groan in protest.

  When Rondeau spoke, Booth’s suit caught fire, which should have been impossible, since the clothing was illusory. A moment later, Ayres realized that Booth himself had caught fire, his mummified body burning like old dry wood, and the flames were merely emerging from the illusion. As Booth shrieked and rolled on the ground, Rondeau sauntered over, picked up his shotgun, and carefully took aim at Booth’s head. The sound of the shot was shockingly loud, and Booth stopped moving, illusion wholly shattered now, and he was a just a headless corpse, half aflame, on the concrete floor, flecks of his mummified head scattered like chips of wood and dirty porcelain. Rondeau pumped the gun again and approached Ayres, grinning. “Hey there. You know, I told Marla she was being too hard on you. Let the old guy alone, I said. He’s harmless, I said. Well, never let it be said I can’t admit when I was wrong. If you like death so much, let’s—”

  Ayres didn’t have much patience for speeches. He lashed out with his walking stick and knocked the gun out of Rondeau’s hands. Rondeau’s eyes went wide and his mouth opened, doubtless to voice another guttural incantation, so Ayres simply shoved his own fist into the man’s gaping mouth and began whacking him upside the head with his stick. Rondeau tried to back away, but Ayres moved forward with him, and then Rondeau bit down on Ayres’s hand, which hurt, but Ayres had believed his own body was a rotting corpse for over a decade; he could handle pain. Rondeau finally threw himself backward, and Ayres’s fist came out of his mouth with a wet pop. Rondeau rolled away, then stood, swaying a little, clearly a bit groggy from the blows to the head. “You’re a nasty old bastard,” Rondeau said, perhaps with something like admiration.

  Death moaned and started to move, and Rondeau was off like a shot, disappearing through a doorway at the back of the club that Ayres couldn’t quite focus on—the passage must have a look-away spell on it. Ayres was not quite up to giving pursuit, and besides, his god needed him. The old necromancer went to the groaning Death and knelt as much as his aching joints would allow. “Are you all right, my lord?”

  “What—what—there was a darkness, a…a space of nothingness, I couldn’t see, I couldn’t think, I was not aware, but now I am aware of the lack of awareness if…if that…” He sat up, and the look on his face was something that, on a human, would have been existential terror.

  “Have you never slept, my lord?” Ayres said. “Or been unconscious?”

  Death looked up at him, then rose. “I do not remember the time before I came into existence. I was born—I came into being—with full awareness, and that awareness has been complete and uninterrupted, until…that. How did he do that?”

  “Magic,” Ayres said with a shrug. “A very old magic, to work on one such as you. Perhaps it was the language of Rondeau’s true race.”

  “Unsettling,” Death muttered. “But certainly an interesting new experience.” He walked over to Booth and kicked the meat and ashes. “Rondeau did this, too?”

  “Indeed.”

  “Hmm.” Death made a vague gesture with his hand.

  Suddenly Booth was whole again, his mummified form as solid as it had been yesterday, and he looked about him with the blank expression of a corpse. “Thank you, sir. The underworld appears much as I left it, and I am pleased to be back here.”

  “Yes, well, it seems I have need of allies.” Strangely, the idea seemed to amuse him.

  “This Rondeau,” Booth said. “Can you banish him as you did Marla?”

  Death shook his head. “I’d need to pluck a living hair from his head to make that work. And even then, the banishment would only apply to the body he has now. He could easily suicide and get a new body, and then we wouldn’t even be able to recognize him.”

  “We shall simply be vigilant for his return, sir,” Booth said. “If it’s not too presumptuous, my lord…”

  Death shrugged. “Speak.”

  “Why not simply kill Marla?” Booth asked. “I know the dagger would then pass to the next chief sorcerer of Felport, but if he proved unwilling to give you the blade, you could simply kill him. You wouldn’t have to kill many before one of them agreed to give up the blade, I’m sure.”

  “Is assassination your only interest, Booth?” Death picked up a fallen chair, placed it upright, and sat down, crossing one leg over the other. “My nature is bringing death. Does your…your postman sort mail for enjoyment? Why would I kill for fun?”

  “Fun, my lord?” Ayres said, feeling he’d lost the thread of the conversation before it was even well under way.

  “Booth wants to know why I don’t kill chief sorcerers until one of them gives me the dagger. Because it’s clumsy, obvious, and boring. It’s the difference between swatting a fly or pulling off its wings and watching it crawl around injured until it dies. The latter is more entertaining. I’m going to live for a significant percentage of eternity, gentlemen. Boredom is very dangerous for my kind. Marla Mason is arrogant. It will amuse me to break her. Let her wander in the wilderness for a while, wondering what I’m doing here, with her city.”

  “That is the way to lay the city flat,” Booth said, voice resonant with relish. “To bring the roof to the foundation, and bury all, in heaps and piles of ruin.”

  “Well, that’s one way to go,” Death said. “I could rain devastation on this place, let Marla watch the smoke rise in the distance, etc. But don’t you think it would bother her more if her city didn’t fall apart without her? If it turned out she wasn’t needed here at all?” He grinned, and his smile was not at all like that of a skull. It was much worse.

  “Ingenious, my lord,” Ayres said, relieved. He still loved Felport, and had no desire to see it razed. Fortunately, Death’s principle trait seemed to be a sort of whimsical cruelty.

  “We could kill a few people, though, just to make the point,” Booth said.

  “We’ll see. Death is a wonderful stick to threaten people with. The most basic form of coercive power. But once they’re dead, they just go to my realm, to a hell of their own devising—or of my devising, if I take a special interest. But it’s more fun to watch them squirm up here.”

  “Rondeau might still make trouble,” Booth said. He ran a hand through his illusory hair, as if remembering his recently shattered skull.

  “I disagree. Rondeau is likely lost without Marla,” Ayres said. “He is her lackey and little more, despite his show of pique just now. I imagine he’ll hide and wait for his mistress to return. You will not find most of your opponents even that formidable. Rondeau has certain qualities that make him uniquely suited to opposing you, but if you don’t let him whisper in your ear a
gain, his magic shouldn’t trouble you.”

  “How did you stop him?” Booth’s tone was caught half between annoyance and appreciation.

  “I am a very old man, as you have both observed. I have learned a great many things in my life, including how to deal with people like Rondeau.” In truth, he’d just been lucky, but why not make himself seem more impressive in the eyes of Death?

  “You’re actually older than I am,” Death said. “In years only, of course. In essence I am as old as the first living thing that ever died on Earth. But perhaps I underestimated your usefulness.” He sighed. “I’d like to take over Marla’s city, bring her people to my side, humble her, prove my strength. Where should I begin?”

  “Not with Rondeau. With…some of the more reasonable sorcerers. Those who will understand which way the wind is blowing.” He thought of Viscarro, but Viscarro would probably seal his vaults at the first whisper of trouble, and while Death could surely circumvent Viscarro’s security, Ayres thought it wise to give his master an easier win to start his conquest. “There’s a sorcerer named Granger who rules Fludd Park, and is intimately familiar with nature magics.” He was also essentially a half-wit, hereditary heir to a little minifiefdom of green space within the city. His ancestors had been great sorcerers, but Granger was a good-natured fool with inherited power and a famous name. He would give in to Death’s demands easily, Ayres suspected, and once one of the city’s leading sorcerers joined them, it would be easier to win over the others.

  “Yes, fine,” Death said. “We’ll take a walk in the park.” He paused. “I still can’t believe Marla doesn’t have a throne room. No one has standards anymore.”

  Rondeau knew what to do. There were procedures. Marla had considered the possibility of a hostile invasion by overwhelming forces—hell, it had almost happened not long ago, when those things that called themselves faeries came pouring out of Fludd Park—though Rondeau had never expected to be the one spearheading counterinvasion operations. Marla was supposed to be here, taking charge, rallying the troops, fucking shit up. But the situation was what it was. Rondeau used an untraceable enchanted cell phone to call Marla, and when he got nothing, not even a ring, he called Hamil and Ernesto, Marla’s closest allies among the city’s sorcerers. He gave them the coded phrase that meant hard-core shit was most assuredly going down. Half an hour after he knocked out Death with a well-placed Curse, Rondeau paced around in what had once been a bomb shelter, underneath the old Savings and Loan building, waiting. He tried to distract himself by browsing the yellowing old paperbacks—1950s potboiler bestsellers—stacked among the crates of dusty rations and bottled water, but though Rondeau usually found distraction easier than concentration, he couldn’t stop thinking about how bad the situation was.

  Hamil arrived first. “What’s happened?”

  “The god of death happened,” Rondeau said.

  Hamil nodded. “He came to the club?”

  “He came, and he banished Marla.” Rondeau related the story, not even embellishing his own exploits as he normally would. Hamil listened gravely, and when Rondeau was finished he clapped him on the shoulder.

  “You did well. We need to get in touch with Marla. I tried calling her on the way over, but…” He shook his head. “No answer. I’m more disturbed by the fact that she hasn’t gotten in touch. If Death is truly what he says—and if he brushed aside Marla’s magics as easily as you say—then she could be anywhere.”

  “How the hell can he banish her?” Rondeau said. “She’s the chief sorcerer of Felport! She is the city, right? So how can he keep her out of herself?”

  “He has the power of a god. He can do most anything he wishes. But you’re right, Marla is the city. Even if Death tries to rule properly, Felport will suffer in Marla’s absence, stutter and shudder like a poorly maintained engine, but it will be a long time before the results become catastrophic. Death may attempt to take her place, but he’s inhuman. He can’t be chief sorcerer, can’t truly take her place—but he can become a tyrant, an occupier. We can only hope he doesn’t decide to burn the city down or kill all the inhabitants to make his point.”

  “We’ll fight him, right? Until Marla gets back?”

  “I will fight,” Hamil said. “In my own way. And you will do your part, I’m sure. But the other sorcerers…you know them, Rondeau, at least well enough. They’re intensely self-interested. Nicolette is a chaos magician, and Death taking over Felport will only cause more chaos and increase her power. She won’t mind. Granger moves where the wind blows. Viscarro will just hide underground until he has no other choice, then he will ally himself with whichever side seems strongest. The Bay Witch may not even come out of the water—honestly, she might not even notice if the city changes hands. The Chamberlain works for a consortium of ghosts, and who knows how those ghosts will feel about Death? As for Ernesto…if he were here, I would be more confident. But he seems to be dawdling, which worries me. He likes Marla, but I’m not sure how much deeper his loyalty goes. The fact is, Death is more powerful than Marla. If he wants to take over Felport, he can. I’m not sure what Marla can do about it.”

  Rondeau sputtered. “Are you kidding? This is Marla. She’s a force of nature!”

  “No, she’s not. You know I think as highly of her as you do, but Death…Death is literally a force of nature. An irresistible force. Irresistible to everyone except you, of course. You might be the only man in the city who can openly stand against Death, because he knows he can’t just end your life if you become too boring or inconvenient.”

  “Fat lot of good it does me,” Rondeau said.

  “Oh, it might do a lot of good.” Ernesto emerged from the shadows of some secret entry to the bomb shelter, axle grease shining on the lapel of his ragged tuxedo. “Sorry I didn’t get here sooner, but I have a bug in this room, so I heard everything.” He tapped his ear. “I’m hurt, Hamil. I’m a loyal Marlista through and through. There’s already some shit going down out there, and it’s not even dawn—Granger has sided with Death, and they’re visiting Nicolette now.”

  “That was fast,” Hamil said. “They’ll be knocking on our doors soon.”

  “Yep,” Ernesto said. “And I think we’d better be there to answer them, and we’d better play nice, too. Oh, we shouldn’t roll over too quick, but we shouldn’t be so much trouble he kills us.”

  “You’re just going to let this guy take over?” Rondeau rose, clenching his fists. “Let him destroy everything Marla’s built here?”

  “Now, now,” Ernesto said. “Settle down, kid. We can keep him from fucking up stuff too bad if we pretend to work with him, maybe. But you don’t have to play nice. I doubt you’ll be able to get close enough to him again for your Curses to work—he’ll be on the lookout for that—but there are other options. Since you’re the one guy old Skull and Bones can’t kill, you’re the perfect candidate to wage a little asymmetrical warfare.”

  “What?” Rondeau said, bewildered.

  “He means you should lead the resistance,” Hamil said, nodding. “And I think it’s an excellent idea.”

  “Me?” Rondeau said. “Look, guys, I hate to put it like this, but I’m Marla’s sidekick, not Che fucking Guevara.”

  “I should hope not,” Hamil said. “Che Guevara lost. You have to win.”

  “Viva la revolución,” Ernesto said.

  6

  M arla sat up, sneezing in a cloud of pollen and shredded flowers. She’d landed on her back—though where she’d fallen from, she wasn’t sure—in a patch of wildflowers beside a two-lane blacktop road. The quarter moon was high, crickets were chirping, and she felt like she’d been shoved into a burlap sack and rolled down a rocky hill while people ran alongside and hit her with sticks. “Death, you fuck,” she said, and sneezed again. She activated her night-eyes so she could see in the darkness around her, but there wasn’t much to see. Suddenly panicked, she looked around for her dagger, and found it in the blue and white flowers at her side. She snatched it up and s
heathed it at her belt, then stood up, wincing as her knees popped. There were flowers on the shoulder on both sides of the road, and pine woods beyond. The only other item in the landscape was a battered metal sign ten feet in front of her that said “Welcome to Felport.”

  Death had picked her up and dumped her on the outskirts of town, on some road she didn’t recognize. She wasn’t even sure if she was north or east of the city; there were lots of woods on the outskirts in both those directions. Dumped in the middle of the night, in the middle of nowhere. Death would pay for that. She gritted her teeth and started to walk toward the sign, when someone grunted and moaned across the road.

  “Pelham?” She hurried across, to find her valet sprawled half in a drainage ditch, his neatly pressed jacket smeared with dirt and rucked up, revealing his pale soft belly. “Are you all right?”

  “I am…battered but whole, Ms. Mason.” She helped him to his feet, where he futilely tried to brush grass and weeds off his coat. “Ready to aid you however I can.”

  “What are you even doing here? Did Death toss you, too?”

  “I am linked to you, Ms. Mason.” He bowed slightly, then climbed out of the ditch. “I suppose when he…sent you here…he sent me as well.”

  “Okay, I’m going to call Hamil and get us a car.” She opened her cell phone and dialed, but it only hissed and crackled static in her ear, and she cursed in frustration. “Damn it, no reception.” Yet the phone’s display showed a clear, strong signal. That was troubling. “We’ll have to go on foot until the phone starts working.”

  “Of course.” Pelham took a tentative step. He would have fallen straight into the ditch again if she hadn’t grabbed his arm.

  “You can’t see, can you? Damn it, you should’ve mentioned.”

  “I’m sorry. Of course you’re right. My apologies.”

  Marla sighed. “I just meant…here. Fiat lux.” He gasped as her spell increased the effectiveness of his vision, allowing his eyes to slurp up stray moonlight and dim reflections so he could see almost as well as in daylight. “Let’s march.” She started down the road at a fast clip.