Water of Souls

by Eli Constant

  “Yeah, that was the name. Thought maybe he was a friend?”

  “No. Not a friend.” My mouth droops, curved into an unhappy, stoic line. “Definitely not a friend, Kyle.”

  Mordecai Jones. Taxidermist ex-con. Drinker of djinn juice. A damn dwarf who, in his own words, never wanted to see me again.

  Well, stealing a woman’s car is a surefire way to see her face again. Looks like it was my turn in the O.K. Corral with Mister Short and Terrifying.

  Nobody touches my Bronco.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  “Do you want to come with me or not? I don’t have time to worry about your hurt feelings.” I’m standing in the kitchen, looking at a sullen Liam on the couch. I swear, the fairy goes from seduction express to ‘child with a broken toy’ mode in sixty seconds flat.

  He doesn’t respond, so I stamp my way into my bedroom and start yanking on proper pants and a sweater. It’s not until I’ve got my socks and boots on, threading my arms through my jacket, that Liam relents.

  “Yes, I’ll go with you. Your first encounter with the dwarf didn’t go well. If you go alone, this time you might get yourself killed.”

  I bristle. “Screw you, Liam. I can handle myself.”

  “Is that why you and Kyle agreed that I should begin training you? Is that because you can,” He throws his hands up, air quotes a slap in the face, “handle yourself.”

  I hate how I blush at everything. Embarrassed? I blush. Pissed? I blush. Horny? I blush. “Just stay here, Liam. I change my mind. I don’t want your company.”

  “Too bad. You’re getting it.”

  “Have fun walking in the snow.”

  He smiles and I want to slap his smug fairy face. “I can run faster than you can drive, Victoria.” He says it like I’m a child and he’s my condescending teacher. I don’t respond. I don’t rise to the bait.

  Of course I don’t.

  “Well then run the fuck home, Mr. Banishment.” As soon as I say the words, I regret them. Hurt flashes across his face, so quick that it’s nearly a dream of a dream. He gave up his home, his people, for me. “I’m sorry, Liam. I know that I need to learn control, that there’s so much that I don’t know. Come with me, help me get my car back, and keep me from pissing off the hangry King Dwarf. Please.” I add the last as an afterthought and I do my best to make it not sound placating.

  “I’m driving,” is all he says as he takes the keys off the wall rack. Before I can protest, he uses his fairy-flitting-fast-fucking power to race down the steps and crank up the black business sedan.

  It’s so dark out that the headlamps are the only bit of light surrounding the moving car. It’s a tunnel of night. We don’t talk as we go, save for Liam giving me a few additional dwarf etiquette notes and warnings on how to handle the negotiation of valuable property with a dwarf. Dwarfs like ‘things’. They like stones and jewels and coins. Cars aren’t really something they’d normally go after, but apparently Mordecai had a bone to pick with me. Which I still didn’t understand since he’d basically said his death would be too soon to see me again.

  When we pull up to Mordecai’s home and business, a single light is burning in the front window. It’s candle flame, not artificial light. I realize, seeing it, that I didn’t see any power lines or signs of utilities when Terrance and I were out here. It hadn’t dawned on me since I’d been too busy trying to keep the boys from spewing testosterone all over the ground.

  “I will approach first, in case this dwarf is more clever than most of his kind and has set traps for unsuspecting visitors.”

  I don’t argue; all I can envision is a fedora-wearing guy with a whip racing away from a gigantic boulder. I do get out of the car though, closing the door to lean against and watch Liam walk towards the porch, illuminated by the still-on glow of the headlights. I whisper, my voice carrying across the unsettling quiet of the woods around us. “Be careful, Liam.”

  Of course. His voice floats through my mind.

  Good. I watch as he mounts the stairs one by one. Were you able to get into the Sherwin’s house today?

  No.

  Liam raises his hand and knocks on the door. I’m glad he’s left the car on so that the lights do not automatically die after a time. There’s no answer, no diminutive man with an attitude opening the door to spit vitriol at the annoyance on his doorstep. Liam knocks again, more persistent this time. Several rapid ‘tap, tap, taps’ followed by a more forceful ‘bang’.

  Still no answer.

  But that’s because Mordecai is not in the house. He’s behind me. “Hello again, Blood Queen.”

  I whirl around, my coat lifting so the cold air snakes up to seep into my thermal shirt.

  Why does it seem like I’m always getting caught with my pants down? Next time I see Terrance, I’m going to finally take him up on those serious self-defense and firearm courses. Not the shitty defense class they offer to folks down at the community fitness center. Terrance is glad I’m taking defense at the Y; he’d pushed me to—because it was a place to start, even if not a great one. But I want the real classes now.

  I want the police academy—‘hit them where it really hurts, take that gun in two moves and live another day’—sort of classes. “Mordecai,” I choke on his name.

  “I see you got my invitation to visit.”

  “Thought you never wanted to see me again.” I cross my arms across my chest and try to look tough. And a split second later, I do feel a hell of a lot tougher... because Liam is standing by my side.

  “Dwarf King Mordecaious of Stonewall, it is an honor.” Liam bends at the waist and flourishes his hand like we’re standing in some proper court versus the muddy, snowy driveway of a fallen King turned taxidermist. “I have read stories of you in the great hall at Evershadow. Your kingdom was the mightiest of the mountains. I should have recognized you when the Blood Queen first entered your new realm.”

  Mordecai, or Mordecaious of Stonewall (a fucking ridiculous name, if you ask me), stands straight with each word Liam utters. Soon, he has called upon his particular brand of magic to become five feet some inches tall.

  “Ah huvnae bin knoon by 'at nam fur some time, far-ee.” Mordecai lapses into the brogue that is his natural voice. “Ah hae business wi' th' bluid queen, nae wi' ye.”

  “I am her servant. Where she is, I go.”

  “Ye werenae wi' 'er earlier, when she cam intae mah realm withit permission.” Mordecai snarls, his upper lip curling to show soil-stained teeth.

  “I was here, just not where you could see me, Dwarf King.” There’s an edge to Liam’s voice now.

  Dammit, what was with the men in my life not being able to keep it in their damn pants? I was tired and I didn’t want to play mediator again today. “Mordecai, where’s my car?”

  “Ah needed a new engine fur mah truck. yoors did nicely. The rest of it, will brin' me a fair chunk at th' scrap yard.”

  “You took apart my Bronco?” Anger floods through me. My father’s face flits into my mind. He gave me that car. It meant something. “You son of a bitch.” I step toward him, raising my hands into the air, and I begin to call the power. It raged inside of me, like a crimson tide, ready to exit the tips of my fingers and reach, like leeching tendrils, towards Mordecai’s body.

  But as soon as the power tries to expel from me towards him, I feel the worst pain of my life. It is what I’d imagine icicles falling from a great height to bore into my brain would feel like. I fall to my knees, clutching my head, crying out in pain.

  “Let her go, Dwarf King.” Liam steps around me, I can feel it in the brush of quick wind against my exposed cheeks. But everything else is obscured by the agony.

  “Make it stop!” I scream, gripping my hair with both hands and yanking outward. I can feel blood trickling now—from my ears and nose and eyes. “God, make it stop!”

  Finally, it does, and I fall gasping to the ground.

  “Noo ye see, bluid queen, 'at Ah hae power, power 'at can droon yer ain. we can
bide in harmony ur we can be enemies. Ah dinnae caur either way.”

  Liam kneels beside me. “Can you stand?”

  I loosen my fingers, letting my scalp untense. The shooting pain is gone. “Yes,” I whisper, knowing that nothing will make me look weaker than I already do. This Dwarf King, living as a common man within the human world, has enough power to break me. I don’t want him for an enemy. I already have one enemy too many.

  “Now,” Mordecai’s body begins to shrink downward until he is his normal size again and his voice returns to the affected American accent, “I did not just bring you here because I had a score to settle, Blood Queen. That is done. I have had my pound of flesh. Or pound of metal, as it were.”

  “What do you want then, Dwarf King?” I try to sound respectful, yet I only sound broken.

  My tone does not faze Mordecai. “The earth has been calling to me, Blood Queen. It tells me of chemicals and blood. It tells me of death.”

  Liam puts his arm around my waist as I begin to sway. The pain, although gone, has left me exhausted. “Dwarfs can communicate with the earth the way you can communicate with spirits, Victoria.”

  I try to think, blinking slowly. “But wouldn’t the earth always be exposed to those things? Animals die. Factories dump waste where they shouldn’t. Blood is spilled everywhere over this and that.”

  “This is different, Blood Queen.” He walks around us and towards his home. “Come.”

  Mordecai is already at his front door before Liam and I begin moving. I really don’t want to go into his house, so dark with no electric lights to brighten the way. But I have to know what he’s talking about. I can feel it’s important. And Liam knows more about dwarfs than I do.

  He would not call you for something normal, Victoria. I can sense in him that something has affected him deeply. The earth is calling for justice and he is its interpreter. We must hear him out.

  I walk, feet heavy like I’m clad in concrete boots, and when I walk through the door to the little house, I feel my chest constrict. I can feel nothing here. No residual spirit energy. No ghost clinging to the foundation. No ether activity miles away. Complete silence of power. It is both suffocating and freeing.

  Dwarfs have ways of guarding their homes from nearly everything. Liam’s arm is still around my body as we walk through the halls, following the candle flame that Mordecai is now holding.

  Wonder if he’d come over and put the guards on my place. I mean it as a joke, but it sounds serious in my head. There are a lot of days—I mean a lot of days—that I’d like to go about my business without worrying if a body was going to rise on the table or a spirit was going to come out of nowhere to ask for my aid.

  I’m afraid it doesn’t quite work that way. The protection magic is woven directly into the soil of the dwarf’s home. It’s tethered to their feel for the land, their presence. Mordecai would have to live with you for the protection spells to work.

  Ha. Well, I guess I’ll deal with the spirits then. They’re preferable.

  Victoria, I’m very sorry about your Bronco. I could feel how much it meant to you.

  I mentally huddle up inside. I’m trying not to think of the car. It’s like saying goodbye to my father all over again. Liam doesn’t press me and try to get me to answer.

  Mordecai pauses for a moment to allow us to catch up. I think he does it purposefully, to allow the light of his candle to filter past the open door to his right. It’s like a train wreck, you can’t help but look. And when you do look, you’re powerless to look away.

  The room is filled with animals in various forms of taxidermy. The most disturbing are those strung from the ceiling by their feet, little buckets beneath them to catch all the blood that drains out. The glassy, dead eyes of a stuffed fox stares at me. I can feel nothing from it, because everything that it once was, save for its skin and fur, has been removed. It is truly a shell now.

  I wonder, in passing, if that is why I did not sense Timothy’s body beneath the lake when it had finally settled there. The chemical mummification of his corpse plus the freezing water and ice had somehow blocked my power. I wonder if even Hellhole Bay would be somewhat quiet during this winter. I do not have time to reach for it with my power to see. Those bodies, those trapped souls and wraiths, are the ones that often keep me up at night with their wailing and misery.

  The taxidermy room goes dark as Mordecai begins moving again. Liam and I follow, silently.

  We’re walking down the hallway again, headed for a final door at the end. It’s ominous, walking in a tunnel of dull light towards a door in the house of a dwarf that was... what? My frenemy?

  Mordecai opens the door. Stairs. Going down.

  I definitely do not want to walk down them. But I do. You know, because that’s what good little necromancer blood queens do—they walk down scary-ass stairs to listen to dwarf ramblings about how Mother Earth is giving him an earful about pollutants and dying rabbits. Fuck.

  When we reach the bottom of the stairs, I’m surprised to see that the candle flame is nowhere to be seen. I wait for my eyes to adjust and they do, slowly, until I can see a pale glowing all around me, like little stars embedded in the walls.

  Only it’s not walls of a house. It’s rock and earth and stones. The stones glow from within, like they possess they’re own inner lights. Liam gasps beside me, momentarily releasing my waist. It’s a good thing that I’ve recovered the strength to stand.

  “Pierras de dios. God stones. But how?” Liam steps forward, leaving me behind. He turns slowly, taking in the thousands of lights around us. “The last of these were supposed to be destroyed after the final dwarf kingdom fell. King Arracus refused to allow their sacred light to be shared with the fairy community. How?” Liam stops moving, focuses on Mordecai—who I now see is standing with his back to the corner of the room. “How, Dwarf King?”

  “Do you truly think that we would destroy the last of these? They are living, breathing creatures. They are everything. They are us all. We could no more kill the stones than kill ourselves.”

  I raise my hand and it’s a stupid thing to do. “Um, excuse me, newbie here. What are these stones supposed to be?”

  “They’re...” Liam shifts his body so he can look at me. The light is filling the room now, brightening until it is midday without sun, “they are creation, Victoria. They are the beginning and they will be the end.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “These stones,” Liam waves his right arm gently, indication the burning stars around us, glowing with incandescent light the color of pale lemons or fresh churned butter. It is good and right and makes me feel warm and safe, “these are God, Victoria. No... that’s not the right way to put it.” He turns to Mordecai. “Please, Dwarf King, explain it to her.”

  Mordecai steps forward, a somber look on his face. “This is a secret that should never have been told, but you are the Blood Queen. The Blood calls to the stones. It begs you to protect life over death. I saw the darkness in you. I saw the desire to kill me. I tasted my death. That is not the path you should walk. Ever since you came, the stones have grown brighter and brighter. They have seeped their power into the earth and filled it with new life. I feel closer to my past, to my kingdom, than I have in a century’s time.

  “These stones, Blood Queen, are the dice that God rolled, tossing his intention out into the cosmos to create worlds upon worlds and creatures upon creatures. They are pieces of his truths, of his essence, left behind to right the world when things go wrong.

  “They are the voice that called the flood and they will be the voice that calls the inferno that burns this world to bring about a new start.

  “They are,” he pauses, tears in his eyes, “God, Blood Queen. And they call to you and your magic. They call you to do good in the world. To quell the bloodshed that it sees coming once again.”

  “That it sees coming again?” I don’t know what to say, not really, but the question falls from my lips like gossamer. Easily and
with purpose. And I know instantly that it is a question that I had to ask. There was no choice in the matter.

  “The Rising. That was not a reaping brought about by God. That was man’s doing. And it hurt the Earth. It weakened her. It almost snuffed out the light.” Mordecai walks forward to the wall of soil closest to him. He presses his body full length against it and he hums softly, a low throaty tune that is wordless and works its way through the air, filling it until Liam and I can do nothing except listen and absorb. “Can’t you hear it?” He says after a moment, pushing his body away from the wall. “Can’t you hear it?”

  I walk forward, passing Liam who is still stood in the center of the room like a man who’s been faced with the lost wonder of the world. When I am but a few inches from the wall, Mordecai reaches for my hand at my side. I flinch away at first, but then I allow him to take my fingers in his and raise my hand upwards and out, until my palm connects with one of the glowing embers in the wall. It is warm and fills me with peace.

  “Listen,” Mordecai whispers, “listen.”

  I close my eyes and I focus. There are no spirits to contend with, nothing calling to the necromancer within me. And in the silence that I am unused to, I hear it. I see it.

  I am racing through the soil, my body pushing through stones and past buried rock and root, past earthworms and bugs, until I encounter a stone I cannot pass. It is grey and buried deep. It also reaches high, higher than the ground, higher than I can go. It takes me a moment to realize that it’s a foundation. I have reached a home. A hand touches my shoulder and suddenly my senses are amplified.

  Together, Mordecai and I push through the concrete blocks and beneath the house. Above us, is a basement area, I can feel the furnishings—all once trees, solid wood and expensive materials. We keep moving forward until we emerge into a room with no walls, a room much like the one we are physically standing in. It is only large enough for a small bed and chair. There is a bucket in the corner.

  We move closer to the bed, walking on legs now instead of soaring through soil. There is something lying beneath the sheets. It does not move. When we have reached the edge of the bed, we reach out together, his hand atop mine, and we pull the sheet slowly. Slowly.