The Price of Life

by T. M. Nienaber

  “Of course.”

  “Well, Elle, you know my medical practice is flourishing and I’m an upstanding member of the community. You’ve made an outstanding reputation for yourself here. I, personally, think it’s time for us to see what you and I could do together. So, Elle.” William walked over to her and took one of her hands in his. “Would you do me the honor of agreeing to be my wife?”

  Miriel didn’t stop to think about the consequences or who the person offering really was. All she saw was the chance to get out of Madame Perkins’s house and away from all those women. She wanted to play the game on her own terms.

  “Of course.”

  22. The War Begins (Lucian and Kristopher)

  “We need to do something about these outskirt societies. They’re taking away a large number of our voters and it’ll be impossible to establish any real control if people can just up and create a new country.”

  “You’re right, I didn’t think this would be such a large inconvenience.” Kristopher looked around at what remained of his Cabinet. Over half of them had left after Lucian’s little show, and now the interns were scared to death. It wasn’t a major setback, Kristopher had always planned to be alone in the end, but he hated things not happening on his terms.

  “Well, these societies are only a problem here, the other states don’t have many, if there are any at all.”

  “True, but I want the problem taken care of. If we start hemorrhaging people it won’t look good.”

  “We could start by limiting them to the communes that have already been established. Force them all to fill out charters and make it illegal to form anything new.”

  “Good, we’ll start with that.” Kristopher looked pleased. “And we can limit transportation passes to those areas. The harder it is to get there the fewer people will try.”

  “Why don’t you start a passport system.” Alexander added from where he stood, leaning against the doorframe, no one could remember him coming in.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Actually treat them like other countries. Make everyone already living there formally renounce their citizenship, and anyone immigrating has to do the same. They have to apply for a non-citizen passport or identification card. Once people realize they won’t be able to get back here easily they’ll start coming home.”

  “And what about all the changes Kristopher has made that are driving people away. You don’t think all these people will be glad to get out of his hell?”

  “If you’d ever been out to these places, like the interns I’ve taken the liberty of sending in as spies, you’d realize what you’re competing with. These areas are small, closed in, and most of them aren’t nearly as self sufficient as they claim. Give it a few months, get a processing and identification system in place, then keep them from being able to buy our resources. They won’t survive for long, people will leave when it gets harder to live. Then you have a flood of people coming back and glad to be here.”

  “Alexander, why don’t you take a seat.” Kristopher pulled out a chair next to him at the table. He was impressed with the young necromancer. The boy had a knack for understanding how these structures were set up and how to manipulate them. It was a great talent. That made him a threat. Kristopher would have to keep him both close and powerless. Alexander had been trained by Lucian, and if he saw the opportunity he would use that power to take over Kristopher’s empire, and probably Lucian’s too. Even if the boy wasn’t planning anything yet Kristopher would not let himself be caught off guard or replaced. “And thank you for your initiative to send out my interns. But I’d like for you to keep decisions like that to me from now on.”

  “Thanks.” Alexander walked over to take a seat but noticed something strange in the way Kristopher was looking at him, and in the tone of his last few words. He knew he hadn’t done anything wrong, Kristopher had given him permission to use the interns for whatever work he found necessary. Something was wrong with Kristopher and that didn’t bode well for him. “I really can’t stay. I just wanted to let you know Lucian’s got people collecting bodies.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “They’re collecting corpses and storing them in the basement.”

  “Why?” Kristopher felt sick, how had he not noticed this going on just a floor below him.

  “No one’s told me anything. I think Lucian’s started to assume my loyalty lies more with you than him. But I can speculate.”

  “Tell me.”

  “What you pulled at the press conference didn’t go over well. I can’t imagine you thought he’d let you get away with it,” Alexander shook his head like he thought Kristopher was an idiot. “Those interns he killed were just a message, what he’s planning now is going to be an actual threat.”

  “I think I can handle anything Lucian can give.” Kristopher chuckled.

  “I know you think you can. But can you tell me where the bodies of those five interns went?”

  There was a quick intake of breath. Kristopher hadn’t even realized the bodies were gone. But they were. He hadn’t told any of his people to take care of them, and yet they were gone. He’d have a lot to answer for when the parents came to prepare their children for burial, or to ask why Lucian wasn’t bringing them back.

  “You aren’t paying attention.” Alexander started walking to the door. “He’s building an army only we can control. If you don’t watch your step your troops will be going to war with the undead and I promise you it’s a fight they won’t be prepared for.”

  “Can you do anything about this?”

  “You can beat the cult by numbers, but you’re going to have to keep people away. He can make some very tempting promises.”

  “How much time do I have?”

  “That’s where you’re lucky, Lucian is never in a rush. He’ll be very agreeable until he’s ready. If you can mend what you’ve done by then he might just stop. Let him think he’s winning.”

  “I’ll leave that to you, since you’re so familiar with how he works.” It would also get Alexander away from him and have Lucian be treated like the idiot for a while. It was embarrassing the way that child thought Kristopher was incapable of fighting on his own. “I think the real issue,” Kristopher made sure to say it loud enough for Alexander to hear. “Are these commune-societies. Let’s get representatives out there and make the changes.”

  Kristopher knew his people were worried about Lucian, but he wasn’t. Lucian and his monsters could kill all the interns they wanted to, he was still immortal. Lucian would never be able to get rid of him, no matter how much he wanted to. A deal was a deal, and with the execution policy in place not a day went by where Kristopher couldn’t hold up his end. Lucian would never be able to catch him off guard again.

  23. Miriel And William

  “How many people do you think we’ll lose?” Miriel looked up at her fiancé from a pile of paperwork.

  Kristopher’s delegates had come earlier that morning with the news. There would be no press conference about this, Kristopher wanted to keep it under wraps as long as possible out of pure meanness. The fewer people who knew about the new restrictions the more who would do something wrong. The more people who broke the law, the more he could kill. It was all just an added bonus to ruining the societies people like William had worked so hard to create.

  “I’m still deciding if I want to tell them.”

  “I don’t think you have a choice, Will. You can’t think Kristopher won’t be checking up on this to make sure you’re following rules.” Miriel wasn’t concerned about policy, she just didn’t want Kristopher sending someone who might recognize her. It would be a disaster even William couldn’t protect her from.

  “Of course I know that,” William snapped. “I’m not suggesting we disregard Kristopher’s rules. I have no interest in having him or that freak Lucian go to war with us.”

  Miriel still bristled whenever anyone insulted Lucian, she considered it a reflex. “Then what do you propose to
do. I think people would like to know their citizenship is being forfeit.”

  “I don’t give a damn what they want or what they need! Half of them are only here to die and most of the other half is just here to kill them. You’ve seen those lines. No one’s too concerned with getting out anytime soon.”

  “That’s because they think they can. They’re here to bide time and then go back to their families and the real world. No one’s here to stay that wasn’t here before this all started.”

  “You’re one to talk about not wanting to be here. Tell me, Elle, are you just waiting out the clock until the man who wanted you dead doesn’t care anymore?”

  “My situation is much more complicated than what you think you know. And it has nothing to do with what’s going on here. As far as anyone outside these gates is concerned I’m dead. I don’t need a passport or a social security number or citizenship papers. I’m a ghost and that’s how I’d like to stay.”

  “You aren’t nearly as special as you think, you know that, Elle? Plenty of people kill for a living,” William said snidely.

  “Fine, alright, plenty of people are just like me, but that isn’t the point. You have a major problem and you need to at least talk to the other founders.”

  “Who do you think you are! You work for me, you’re only alive because of me! How dare you think you can tell me what’s best for a place I built. You don’t know anything about how to deal with people so you’ll stay silent, especially when it comes to how I should be doing my job.”

  “William, what the hell is wrong with you? We’re partners in this now, don’t you act like you don’t need me. I could take my chances on the other side if I had to. I’ve survived out there on my own before. You aren’t granting me asylum for asylum’s sake. We’re both using each other.”

  “And what about Madame Perkin’s house? You’re desperate to get out of there and that only happens if you marry me. So you need me yet again and I swoop in to help you out, for what? Zero gratitude and a condescending tone.”

  “Oh shut up, William. You don’t think I know you were the biggest joke of all the founders before I got here? You think I don’t know you need me to keep your place as the number one? You might be able to keep me drowning in the sea of idiot women at the training house, but I can turn you back into the joke you are. Did you like obscurity, William, would you like to go back to that? Back to no one taking you seriously? Back to not having a say in anything that goes on in the society you built yourself?”

  William raised his arm like he was going to backhand her, but lowered it quickly. Miriel was right, and that was what had him so upset. All the founders now looked to him as the leader, and the more power he had the more he realized it all belonged to Miriel. He hated having to share credit for his power with her, and certain founders didn’t believe he had made the improvements he had all alone. They were starting to ask questions. Eventually they would discover who Miriel was and everything he had worked for would belong to her. William had no choice. He had to keep Miriel on his side and she had to stay willingly.

  “Elle, dear, I’m so sorry. You’re absolutely right.” He tried one of his charming smiles. “As usual. It’s all the stress of the Kristopher administration and the changes. I’m not sure how long we’ll really be able to survive and we’ve worked so hard to make this place what it is.”

  “Of course, Will, I understand,” Miriel cooed. She didn’t believe a word of it, but the game was all she had. Miriel would play along, keep an eye on him, and when William finally broke for good she’d kill him.

  “Oh thank you, darling. Now, let me tell you my plan. I need your help.” William pulled out the stack of entrance papers they’d been filling out for the new members. “Now, everyone signed these and no one bothered to read them. If anyone bothers to ask tell them signing this forfeit their citizenship, and all you have to do is forge their signatures on the new immigration papers.”

  Miriel nodded. “It’s an excellent plan, but I’m an assassin not a forger.”

  “But you have to have forged things before. All your fake identities and stuff like that.”

  “That’s not the same as forgery. It’s all still variations of my signature, just different words. And there’s no real signature to compare it to.”

  “Some of the skills have to transfer over.”

  “It’s not the same thing.”

  “What about when you fake a suicide, you’d have to forge a note.”

  “Not all suicides leave a note.”

  “Are you honestly refusing to help me, Elle! We need to do this, it’s the only option we have.”

  “There has to be someone here better qualified than me.” Miriel was actually a very talented forger, she’d had to fake documents all the time when working for Jon. The real problem was Lucian. If he looked at any of these documents he’d recognize her work.

  “I’m asking you.” William’s temper started to show through again.

  “Fine, I’ll do my best.” She would just have to hope Kristopher and Lucian weren’t getting along, and Lucian was being kept in the dark about all the citizenship papers. Then Lucian would never see the documents.

  “Excellent!” His charming smile returned. “Now, I have a very important founders meeting. I’ll tell them how I’ve fixed this little situation and be back to check on you later. Oh, and in case anyone asks, you had nothing to do with any of this.”

  Miriel gave a forced smile and pulled over a chair.

  “Oh, and try to get all those done by tonight, I’d really appreciate it.”

  Maybe if she waited long enough someone would kill William for her. Miriel thought about his death happily as she started working on her signatures.

  24. Lucian and Kristopher

  “Alexander!” Kristopher called shrilly from his new office. The office was really just a converted first floor bedroom, but Kristopher was happy with it. It was a step up from the dining room he’d been using before, even if it was smaller. The door was large and solid oak with ornate carvings worked into it, very intimidating. It also shook everything around it when Kristopher slammed the door shut, and that was his favorite feature. Kristopher was a man who liked people to know he was there.

  Alexander walked swiftly into the office. He was dressed in an all black suit, the new dress code for Kristopher’s public necromancers. He no longer looked like an eager and wide-eyed acolyte, but being killed and brought back to life several times had that effect on everyone. He was intimidating to look at, and Lucian was heartbroken to know he had lost the young man to Kristopher’s side. Kristopher, on the other hand, was working out ways to keep Alexander from fulfilling all the talent he’d displayed. The same could not be said for the other two boys he was once inseparable with. Robert was killed for trying to escape to a commune after the Kristopher administration sent out their rules about immigration. Thomas had attempted to perform a resurrection shortly after the election to show off for a crowd and was attacked by a violent spirit. Lucian had to put the poor boy out of his misery before he became too tortured to die. Power looked good on Alexander, he had grown into the type of necromancer Kristopher had wanted on his side in the first place. He wasn’t old world like Lucian, and he was gaining enough confidence to start making his own rules when it came to the cult.

  “Yes?”

  “I need you to put our patrols into effect today.”

  “No warning?”

  “This is war and I’m in charge. That’s all the warning anyone needs.”

  Alexander nodded and walked out. He didn’t ask questions, another thing Kristopher liked about him.

  Lucian hadn’t wanted any part in the patrols. They would be monitoring citizens 24 hours a day, and taught to look for the slightest law violation. It was the best way to keep inflating Kristopher’s body count, but Kristopher was almost impossible to keep under control. Lucian didn’t mind being in the public eye every now and then, but the partnership was falling apart. Lucian fel
t like a political chaplain, and with enforcement of patrols he would be slipping even further out of power. The cult wasn’t growing the way he wanted it to either. People were realizing if they sided wholly with Kristopher they gained all the benefits Lucian had to offer without getting their hands dirty. Immortality was tempting, but morality was starting to win out. Kristopher was offering the cleaner option.

  The undead army was growing, but Lucian couldn’t afford to set it on Kristopher now. The zombies lost their power until a declaration of outright war. The only positive was Kristopher wanted nothing to do with the undead, so Lucian was able to control them on his own. There were also the cult members who had no interest in Kristopher’s plans for world domination, and they still stood wholeheartedly with Lucian. If it came down to it, he could have a very powerful army, but for now there was no point in making waves. As long as Kristopher was immortal any fight would end in a stalemate.

  “We’re sending out patrols tonight. Kristopher needs shifts to send out with them.” Alexander stared down Lucian, all his former admiration was gone. As far as he was concerned Lucian was nothing more than a relic.

  “Then talk to the soldiers, you don’t need me.” Lucian looked up from his books, annoyed that Alexander could walk into his lab without knocking. All Kristopher’s men held the place at a wary distance, but Alexander was one of Lucian’s own, and that entitlement hadn’t worn off yet.

  “You know exactly why I’m here, Lucian.” Alexander was leaning against the door jam, absorbed more in his blackberry than his conversation, but he did take the time to throw a disdainful glance up at Lucian before returning his gaze to the screen.

  “There’s no need to have necromancers on patrol.”

  “Orders are orders.” Alexander shrugged.

  “If all you’re trying to do is keep the peace I don’t find it necessary. Besides, my men are stretched thin as it is. All they have time for is going out to the front lines and raising dead soldiers. Soldiers who’ve died protecting citizens from idiots not ready to cope with Kristopher’s utopia. Not to mention all the casualties I’ve had due to improper resurrections. You tell Kristopher he needs to give me time to properly train my men and then we’ll talk about favors.”