by Paula Guran
More followed. Some were little more than skeletons. Others were fresher. Some still had patches of flesh hanging from their bones, and some were well preserved—perhaps in the depths of that miniature sea—but had swelled up, intestinal gasses inflating them into obscene balloons. The dead sea-folk, the corpses of the Merlangai, were rising from their graves.
Gorel could not let that happen.
The top half of the machine was spinning faster and faster. Mud and boiling water churned between its three metal legs. “Shut it down!”
“It’s too late—” Professor Deth said. “It would require re-calibration for the pacification protocols to take effect—” said Dr. Blud.
“Fuck it,” Gorel said, and shot Deth in the chest.
The professor took a step back. His legs buckled. He put a hand to his thorax, placed his finger into the hole there, looked up at Gorel with what could have been amazement, and said, “You shot me.”
“Turn it off!”
“You fucking idiot!”
“Gentlemen,” Dr. Blud said. “Please. I abhor this sort of language.”
“He shot me!”
The doctor made a sound something like, “Pffah.”
Professor Deth shuddered. “I hate when this happens,” he said.
“Unavoidable, in our line of work,” Dr. Blud said.
“Nevertheless.”
Gorel stared at them. The professor continued to shudder. Lights began to glow over his wrists, his neck, his knees. “Bastard,” he said.
The hole in his chest grew smaller and disappeared. The professor stood up, cleared his throat for a long moment, and spat. A metal object flew from his mouth and bounced on the ground. It was Gorel’s bullet. Gorel said, “Shit.”
On the lake, more and more of the submerged dead appeared. They all waded toward the shore in unison. Where they mounted dry land they continued, passing Gorel and his two companions, completely ignoring them.
“What did you make them do?” Gorel said.
“She made us do it!” Dr. Blud said.
Gorel stopped. “They’re going to the god’s tomb,” he said slowly.
“Well . . . ” Professor Deth said.
“She doesn’t like him, you see,” Dr. Blud said.
“Though he does love her so.”
“But she does not love him back.”
“She loves another.”
“Death is not a barrier to love.”
“Quite. And rather poetic, my friend.”
“Thank you. I shall write it down.”
“Shut up!” beside them, the machine hummed one last time and was silenced.
“A war amongst the dead?” Gorel said.
“Unfortunate,” Dr. Blud said.
“Fascinating,” Professor Deth said.
“We shall present a paper on the subject at the next conference,” said Dr. Blud.
“Perhaps a book—”
“Not a war, in any case—”
“A skirmish—”
“Internal conflict—”
Gorel tuned them out. Around them the clouds were dispersing, the lightning easing though not entirely disappearing. He watched the dance of blue on blue. A bolt hit one of the last corpses to come ashore, one of the bloated ones from the bottom, and the resulting explosion threw chunks of flesh and bones and a cloud of noxious gas around the immediate area.
“Dead or alive,” Gorel said, after he had finished wiping off the more obvious bits of rotten flesh from his clothes, “you’re coming with me.”
“Gladly,” said Dr. Blud.
“Wouldn’t miss it for the world,” said Professor Deth.
“Who gave you the—” what was it? “—the death sounds of Greater Pond?”
He knew of Greater Pond. It was once one of the great Merlangai cities—one of the forbidden, abandoned places, now. “Was it the god?”
“The god?”
“Why would—”
“You still haven’t figured it out, have you—”
“Really, sheriff, you’re pretty dense for someone with your responsibilities—”
“It was the lover.”
“The necromancer.”
“And so.”
“And so.”
And Gorel, realizing at last what was happening in the Garden, cursed and then said, “Not on my fucking watch.”
Part Six: Death Wore a Veil
The tomb of the unknown god rose out of the cemetery ground, a pyramid of metal shining a sickly green. The makeshift army of dead Merlangai walked toward the tomb. Somewhere, Gorel knew, would be the instigator of their undead rebellion: Seraph Gadashtill, Ninth Caliph of Mindano Caliphate, last in the line of the necromancer-kings.
Last, Gorel thought, but not just that. He had been misled more than once, and it was because he had tried to think like a lawman, which he was not. Nothing was ever solved with clever deduction, with clues and witnesses and due process. But a lot of things could be solved with a gun.
He could have disposed of Blud and Deth. He had chosen not to. They thought he did not understand the ways of the dead, and perhaps he didn’t. But he did know how to kill them, in a final sort of way. Instead, he and the two scientists followed the army of undead toward the god’s tomb.
Death, dead, undead, whatever, Gorel thought. They were just words, and they all meant the same. There was no real life after death, whatever the necromancers and the spirit-talkers, the shamans and priests and wizards may say. The dead were words. They were a residue of what had been before. The dead could no more love than make love. They were fragments, torn pieces of what had been, what had gone before and was gone forever. None of this, he thought, was any of his business. Yet he did not like to be made a fool of—and besides . . .
He could smell the dust from here.
Dust. The great curse he had been afflicted with. The power of the gods, the drug with which they could enslave the living. The army of the dead Merlangai marched, and the fog cleared, and a moon shone down, yellow like a rotting tooth.
Before the great pyramid of the unnamed god, the plain of the cemetery was filled with the dead.
There were Avians there, with skeletal wings that kept them afloat against all probability; there were spider-like creatures the likes of which Gorel had never before seen; there were countless humans and those of the frog-tribes, the falangs; and coming forth from the direction of Gardentown, there was a group of Zambur, silent and pale, coming forward in a great wave of white foam.
Coming toward him.
“Perhaps—” Dr. Blud said.
“A war is an appropriate term—” said Professor Deth.
“A battle—” said Dr. Blud.
“Interesting how the dead Avians can still hover despite the lack of functioning wings,” said Professor Deth.
“My dear fellow! We must take notes—”
“Make sketches—”
“Survey—”
“Annotate—”
Gorel said, “Who killed the women?”
“The women?” Blud and Deth, exchanging glances.
“Who can tell?” Dr. Blud said at last.
“Perhaps the god,” Professor Deth said.
“The necromancer—” Dr. Blud said.
“Perhaps you,” Professor Deth said.
The two men turned their gaze on Gorel.
“I don’t think so,” Gorel said, speaking slowly. He felt more irritation than outright anger.
“Sheriff?”
“Will you put down that knife?”
For the first time, the two men looked worried.
“It could have been you,” Gorel pointed out. The point of the blade was aimed at the men. They took a step back, in unison.
“Not us.”
“Why would we—”
“Put down the knife!”
Could he prove it? Did it matter, in the last count, just who had killed the caretaker, who stole the face of Kelini Pashtill? Perhaps he just found the two men irritati
ng, perhaps . . .
The two didn’t quite die. He hadn’t expected them to.
Professor Deth, spitting blood, said, “What did you—?”
“But why?” Dr. Blud said.
There was a lot of blood.
Gorel worked with the knife. He preferred guns, but sometimes the situation called for knife work, and the knife seemed to sing its bloodied song in his hand. The knife felt right—it felt good. Gorel sliced away flesh, cut through bone. The two men never screamed or cried, even when Gorel had sliced the professor’s nose clean off and both of the doctor’s ears. They tried to reform, they tried to charge him. Gorel hit, using Professor Deth as a punching bag, his fists taking the podgy man in the face, in the stomach. The knife again, not killing but cutting, slicing, removing flesh. The pieces of the two men’s flesh trembled and shook on the ground and, like crabs, tried to crawl back toward their masters.
“Where is she?” Gorel said.
“Fuck you!” Dr. Blud said. His head was hanging at an unnatural angle from his neck. Gorel kicked it. What remained of Professor Deth jumped on him, teeth sinking into Gorel’s neck, blood pouring out. He punched and pummeled but the professor held on, teeth sinking deeper. He began to drink from the wound, sucking in Gorel’s blood with great gulping sounds. Gorel cursed, reached, grabbed the man by an ear and pulled. He threw the professor to the ground and pointed his gun at him. “Where,” he said, “is she?”
“In the tomb!” Professor Deth said.
The bands of light were glowing at full brightness along the remains of the body, the torn fragments slowly gathering back toward their master. Beside him, Dr. Blud was trying to straighten his head over his broken neck, similar light engulfing him. But their movements were slow and sluggish. “Where in the tomb?”
“Above ground,” Dr. Blud said.
“Damn you.”
“At the very top,” Professor Deth said.
“The apex,” Dr. Blud said.
“Peak—”
“Summit—”
In the end, they defeated him. Gorel gave up.
He left them to it. He did not think they would be going anywhere in a hurry but he had the feeling that, even if all else in the Garden, in Kur-a-len, was truly laid to rest at last, those two would somehow still be there, walking away, their flesh reassembling. In their way they were worse than the dead.
He left them strewn on the ground, angry eyes still staring up at him, and walked away.
“Where are you?” he said, but there was no answer, and he hadn’t expected one. He walked toward the great pyramid, the tomb of the unknown god.
The dead swarmed between the graves.
Many of them human—some little more than bones strung together, like a shaman’s talisman, some with flesh still hanging from their frames. The ghost of Nocturnes glided through shadows. There were falangs there, the frog-tribes of Tharat, Ebong with their great helmet heads. There were species he had never seen before—all who were once no doubt great—all reduced now to this makeshift shambling army of corpses, all enthralled in the command of the necromancer-king, Seraph Gadashtill, in quest of his one love. And yet there had been no response from the god’s tomb, no army raised in reply, and Gorel, stalking toward the grave, suddenly stopped . . .
Something wasn’t right. A piece still missing, a sudden suspicion rising—
He was nearly at the tomb. A sturdy door with many locks, and he shot them all, the sound lost in the groaning of the shambling creatures. Kicked it and it crashed back and he went in.
Silence.
The tomb was dark and empty, corridors leading into a silence of disuse. A staircase. She would be at the top . . . yet he hesitated. A thrumming under his feet, as if the entire structure was vibrating. Where was the god?
He thought of that entire edifice underground, the great churning factory. Yet there was nothing up here, an empty shell like all graves . . .
A piece of masonry fell, narrowly missing his head.
He thought: the god wasn’t there.
Where would he be?
He began to run down the stairs.
Behind him the tomb was shaking. He thought of the energies trapped underground. They were being channeled—but for what purpose?
Out the door, and running still, pushing away the animated corpses. The wave of Zambur close now, in disarray. He had been charged with maintaining order in this hellish place, and he had failed.
He ran, his breath ragged. Away from the tomb. “Get away!” he shouted. The Zambur emitted high-pitch screams. “It’s a trap!” He ran past them. Toward the town. He felt the ground shake beneath his feet.
When the explosion came it lifted him off his feet and threw him in the air. Bright light like jade illuminating the night. Tumbling, he saw the massive grave of the unknown god disintegrating, the jade light shooting out of it, the dead around it, caught in the light, turning to dust without a sound.
He fell—it felt to him very slowly—until he hit the ground.
It is too late for you now, she said. She was there again, and so was he, in the dark of forced sleep, and they were standing, he realized, outside the great palace of Goliris, and she was very beautiful.
“Tell me,” he said, demanded. She shook her head. It is far beyond even you, Gorel of Goliris, she said. We are both exiles. Forget Goliris, it is no more, not for you.
“I will return,” Gorel said. “Even death will not stop me.”
A laudable sentiment, she said, wryly. But being the lord of death is something you discover to be, essentially, empty of meaning. And you are mortal, and far from your home—and you are empty, too, are you not, Gorel of Goliris?
“I don’t—” he said, and fell silent. She nodded, and they walked together through the gardens, and saw no one and nothing living. You have nothing but revenge, she said, and what is that but a crutch? Seek love, instead, my cousin.
“And you,” he said with a sneer, “who do you love, princess of Goliris?”
She sighed, and above their heads the sky darkened, and the palace seemed to grow distant again, and they were standing on the great shore of Goliris, and the waves were wild and dark like things alive. I loved them both, she said. And now I am tired . . . how will it end?
“Are you whole, now?”
She shrugged. Have I ever been, she said, half question, half statement.
“You have the face, and the heart . . . ” he thought it through. The foam of the dark sea of Goliris fell on him, and he felt a chill. “What else do you need, to live again?”
She laughed. Only you, my cousin, she said. Yet I see you are, despite a loving guiding hand, not dead.
The tomb. The explosion. And he—
“No,” he said. She was growing weaker, and Goliris was fading around them, a dream world of no substance.
I need your eyes, to see again, to live again. Only your eyes. Is that too much to ask, from family? She sighed then, the voice like wind stirring dead leaves. I shall wait, then, she said. I have waited long enough, a little more time will make no change . . . And anyway you cannot help but come to me. Can you, Gorel of Goliris?
And she was gone, and the world was dark, then jade.
When he opened his eyes he was lying on the ground and around him was a wasteland.
The graves had gone, the god’s tomb, and with them the dead. The world was a flat expanse of land, with no markers. A memory of a dream came back to him—he was standing on a vast expanse of land, and the dead were calling to him, a multitude of voices—but there were no more voices here, only a profound silence. They were gone.
At that moment he craved dust, knew its absence with a black despair. His body shook uncontrollably. He took deep breaths, but the sensation would not go away: deprivation, of the worst kind, an absence that bore into the very core of him. He craved the drug, felt helpless in its abeyance.
Only revenge motivated him still. He took deep breaths and focused on that harder, impenetrable core ins
ide himself: the heir of Goliris, exiled from his home, doomed to wander the World in search of those who doomed him so. Revenge was strong, still. The blood pulsed in his head. He craved the black kiss and cursed it. His guns seemed to whisper to him. Use us. Avenge the dead. Kill something.
But how do you kill something that is already dead?
Well, he thought—he’d done it before.
He rose slowly, the whispering of armaments loud in his ears. He had been so wrong . . .
Somewhere nearby—sound. He turned. The ground moved. He aimed the gun, then lowered it again. A small, pathetic figure climbed out of the ground. “Jais!” it said.
Gorel watched the creature come close. Its face was creased—in misery or happiness, he couldn’t tell. Masonry shifted all around, and he watched them in the moonlight, hundreds of Jais.
“Jais!”
“I remember,” Gorel said.
The creature came closer and, startling Gorel, reached out its hand, touching Gorel’s. “Gorel!” it said.
It whistled, or so it seemed. Another of the Jais came close. He thought it could have been a female, but wasn’t sure. The little creature squatted on the ground, rocking on its heels. Gorel said, “No, really—”
There was a burst of gas, a gasp of pain. A stone the size of a fist lay on the ground, a stone that wasn’t diamond or ruby or emerald but, strangely, even more beautiful, wrapped in rainbows as it shone in the moonlight.
“Gorel!” the first Jais said, and it went over to the stone and picked it up. His small leathery face seemed to smile. He went up to Gorel again and put the stone at his feet, then stepped back. The other one scampered away.
Gorel picked up the stone.
“Thank you,” he said.
“Gorel!” the Jais said. Then it darted off and returned, a moment later, holding two metallic objects in his hand.
“What is that?” Gorel said. The Jais, looking suddenly nervous, took a step back from him, then threw the two objects on the ground and ran away.
Gorel put away the stone, picked away the metal objects—they were bullets.