Circus of the Damned

by Laurell K. Hamilton

  "The zombie had broken free of your control, Larry. If I hadn't come along and fed it blood, it would have found blood on its own. Do you understand?"

  "I don't think so."

  I sighed. "The zombie would have attacked someone. Taken a bite out of someone."

  "Zombies attacking humans is just superstition, ghost stories."

  "Is that what they're teaching in college now?" I asked.

  "Yes."

  "I'll loan you some back copies of The Animator. Trust me, Larry, zombies do attack people. I've seen people killed by them."

  "You're just trying to scare me," he said.

  "Scared would be better than stupid."

  "I raised it. What do you want from me?" He looked completely baffled.

  "I want you to understand what nearly happened here tonight. I want you to understand that what we do isn't a game. It's not parlor tricks. It's real, and it can be dangerous."

  "Alright," he said. He'd given in too easily. He didn't really believe. He was humoring me. But there are some things you can't tell someone. He, or she, has to learn some things in person. I wished I could wrap Larry up in cellophane and keep him on a shelf, all safe and secure and untouched, but life didn't work that way. If he stayed in this business long enough, the new would wear off. But you can't tell someone who's reached twenty and never been touched by death. They don't believe in the boogeyman.

  At twenty I'd believed in everything. I suddenly felt old.

  Larry pulled a pack of cigarettes out of his coat pocket.

  "Please tell me you don't smoke," I said.

  He looked up at me, eyes sort of wide and startled. "You don't smoke?"

  "No."

  "You don't like people to smoke around you?" He made it a question.

  "No," I said.

  "Look, I feel pretty awful right now. I need the cigarette, okay?"

  "Need it?"

  "Yeah, need it." He had one slender white cigarette between two fingers of his right hand. The pack had disappeared back into his pocket. A disposable lighter had appeared. He looked at me very steadily. His hands were shaking just a bit.

  Shit. He'd raised three zombies on his first night out, and I was going to be talking to Bert about the wisdom of sending Larry out on his own.

  Besides, we were outside. "Go ahead."

  "Thanks."

  He lit the cigarette and drew a deep breath of nicotine and tar. Smoke curled out of his mouth and nose, like pale ghosts. "Feel better already," he said.

  I shrugged. "Just so you don't smoke in the car with me."

  "No problem," he said. The tip of his cigarette pulsed orange in the dark as he sucked on it. He looked past me, letting smoke curl from his lips as he said, "We're being paged."

  I turned and, sure enough, the lawyers were waving at us. I felt like a janitor being called in to clean up the messy necessities. I stood up, and Larry followed me.

  "You sure you feel well enough for this?" I asked.

  "I couldn't raise a dead ant, but I think I'm up to watching you do it."

  There were bruises under his eyes and the skin was too tight around his mouth, but if he wanted to play macho man who was I to stop him? "Great; let's do it."

  I got salt out of my trunk. It was perfectly legal to carry zombie-raising supplies. I suppose the machete that I used for beheading chickens could be used as a weapon, but the rest of the stuff was considered harmless. Shows you what the legal system knows about zombies.

  Andrew Doughal had recovered himself. He still looked a little waxy, but his face was serious, concerned, alive. He smoothed a hand down the stylish lapel of his suit coat. He looked down at me, not just because he was taller but because he was good at looking down. Some people have a real talent for being condescending.

  "Do you know what's happening, Mr. Doughal?" I asked the zombie.

  He looked down his narrow patrician nose. "I am going home with my wife."

  I sighed. I hated it when zombies didn't realize they were dead. They acted so . . . human.

  "Mr. Doughal, do you know why you're in a cemetery?"

  "What's happening?" one of the lawyers asked.

  "He's forgotten that he's dead," I said softly.

  The zombie stared at me, perfectly arrogant. He must have been a real pain in the ass when he was alive, but even assholes are piteous once in a while.

  "I don't know what you are babbling about," the zombie said. "You obviously are suffering from some delusion."

  "Can you explain why you are here in a cemetery?" I asked.

  "I don't have to explain anything to you."

  "Do you remember how you got to the cemetery?"

  "We . . . we drove, of course." The first hint of unease wavered through his voice.

  "You're guessing, Mr. Doughal. You don't really remember driving to the cemetery, do you?"

  "I . . . I . . ." He looked at his wife, his grown children, but they were walking to their cars. No one even looked back. He was dead, no getting around that, but most families didn't just walk away. They might be horrified, or saddened, or even sickened, but they were never neutral. The Doughals had gotten the will signed, and they were leaving. They had their inheritance. Let good ol' dad crawl back into his grave.

  He called, "Emily?"

  She hesitated, stiffening, but one of her sons grabbed her arm and hurried her toward the cars. Was he embarrassed, or scared?

  "I want to go home," he yelled after them. The arrogance had leaked away, and all that was left was that sickening fear, the desperate need not to believe. He felt so alive. How could he possibly be dead?

  His wife half-turned. "Andrew, I'm sorry." Her grown children hustled her into the nearest car. You would have thought they were the getaway drivers for a bank robbery, they peeled out so fast.

  The lawyers and secretaries left as fast as was decent. Everybody had what they'd come for. They were done with the corpse. The trouble was that the "corpse" was staring after them like a child who was left in the dark.

  Why couldn't he have stayed an arrogant SOB?

  "Why are they leaving me?" he asked.

  "You died, Mr. Doughal, nearly a week ago."

  "No, it's not true."

  Larry moved up beside me. "You really are dead, Mr. Doughal. I raised you from the dead myself."

  He stared from one to the other of us. He was beginning to run out of excuses. "I don't feel dead."

  "Trust us, Mr. Doughal, you are dead," I said.

  "Will it hurt?"

  A lot of zombies asked that; will it hurt to go back into the grave? "No, Mr. Doughal, it doesn't hurt. I promise."

  He took a deep, shaking breath and nodded. "I'm dead, really dead?"

  "Yes."

  "Then put me back, please." He had rallied and found his dignity. It was nightmarish when the zombie refused to believe. You could still lay them to rest, but the clients had to hold them down on the grave while they screamed. I'd only had that happen twice, but I remembered each time as if it had happened last night. Some things don't dim with time.

  I threw salt against his chest. It sounded like sleet hitting a roof. "With salt I bind you to your grave."

  I had the still-bloody knife in my hand. I wiped the gelling blood across his lips. He didn't jerk away. He believed. "With blood and steel I bind you to your grave, Andrew Doughal. Be at peace, and walk no more."

  The zombie laid full length on the mound of flowers. The flowers seemed to flow over him like quicksand, and just like that he was swallowed back into the grave.

  We stood there a minute in the empty graveyard. The only sounds were the wind sighing high up in the trees and the melancholy song of the year's last crickets. In Charlotte's Web, the crickets sang, "Summer is over and gone. Over and gone, over and gone. Summer is dying, dying." The first hard frost, and the crickets would be dying. They were like Chicken Little, who told everyone the sky was falling; except in this case, the crickets were right.

  The crickets stopped
suddenly like someone had turned a switch. I held my breath, straining to hear. There was nothing but the wind, and yet . . . My shoulders were so tight they hurt. "Larry?"

  He turned innocent eyes to me. "What?"

  There, three trees to our left, a man's figure was silhouetted against the moonlight. I caught movement out of the corner of my eye, on the right side. More than one. The darkness felt alive with eyes. More than two.

  I used Larry's body to shield me from the eyes, drawing my gun, holding it along my leg so it wouldn't be obvious.

  Larry's eyes widened. "Jesus, what's wrong?" His voice was a hoarse whisper. He didn't give us away. Good for him. I started herding him towards the cars, slowly, just your friendly neighborhood animators finished with their night's work and going home to a well-deserved rest.

  "There are people out here."

  "After us?"

  "After me, more likely," I said.

  "Why?"

  I shook my head. "No time for explanations. When I say run, run like hell for the cars."

  "How do you know they mean to hurt us?" His eyes were flashing a lot of white. He saw them now, too. Shadows moving closer, people out in the dark.

  "How do you know they don't mean to hurt us?" I asked.

  "Good point," he said. His breathing was fast and shallow. We were maybe twenty feet from the cars.

  "Run," I said.

  "What?" His voice sounded startled.

  I grabbed his arm and dragged him into a run for the cars. I pointed the gun at the ground, still hoping whoever it was wouldn't be prepared for a gun.

  Larry was running on his own, puffing a little from fear, smoking, and maybe he didn't run four miles every other day.

  A man stepped in front of the cars. He brought up a large revolver. The Browning was already moving. It fired before my aim was steady. The muzzle flashed brilliant in the dark. The man jumped, not used to being shot at. His shot whined into the darkness to our left. He froze for the seconds it took me to aim and fire again. Then he crumpled to the ground and didn't get up again.

  "Shit." Larry breathed it like a sigh.

  A voice yelled. "She's got a gun."

  "Where's Martin?"

  "She shot him."

  I guess Martin was the one with the gun. He still wasn't moving. I didn't know if I killed him or not. I wasn't sure I cared, as long as he didn't get up and shoot at us again.

  My car was closer. I shoved car keys into Larry's hands. "Open the door, open the passenger side door, then start the car. Do you understand me?"

  He nodded, freckles standing out in the pale circle of his face. I had to trust that he wouldn't panic and take off without me. He wouldn't do it out of malice, just fear.

  Figures were converging from all directions. There had to be a dozen or more. The sound of running feet whispering on grass came over the wind.

  Larry stepped over the body. I kicked a .45 away from the limp hand. The gun slid out of sight under the car. If I hadn't been pressed for time, I'd have checked his pulse. I always like to know if I've killed someone. Makes the police report go so much smoother.

  Larry had the car door open and was leaning over to unlock the passenger side door. I aimed at one of the running figures and pulled the trigger. The figure stumbled, fell, and started screaming. The others hesitated. They weren't used to being shot at. Poor babies.

  I slid into the car and yelled, "Drive, drive, drive!"

  Larry peeled out in a spray of gravel. The car fishtailed, headlights swaying crazily. "Don't wrap us around a tree, Larry."

  His eyes flicked to me. "Sorry." The car slowed from stomach-turning speed to grab-the-door-handle-and-hold-on speed. We were staying between the trees; that was something.

  The headlights bounced off trees; tombstones flashed white. The car skidded around a curve, gravel spitting. A man stood framed in the middle of the road. Jeremy Ruebens of Humans First stood pale and shining in the lights. He stood in the middle of a flat stretch of road. If we could make the turn beyond him, we'd be out on the highway and safe.

  The car was slowing down.

  "What are you doing?" I asked.

  "I can't just hit him," Larry said.

  "The hell you can't."

  "I can't!" His voice wasn't outraged, it was scared.

  "He's just playing chicken with us, Larry. He'll move."

  "Are you sure?" A little boy's voice asking if there really was a monster in the closet.

  "I'm sure; now floor it and get us out of here."

  He pressed down on the accelerator. The car jumped forward, rushing toward the small, straight figure of Jeremy Ruebens.

  "He's not moving," Larry said.

  "He'll move," I said.

  "Are you sure?"

  "Trust me."

  His eyes flicked to me, then back to the road. "You better be right," he whispered.

  I believed Ruebens would move. Honest. But even if he wasn't bluffing, the only way out was either past him or through him. It was Ruebens's choice.

  The headlights bathed him in glaring white light. His small, dark features glared at us. He wasn't moving.

  "He isn't moving," Larry said.

  "He'll move," I said.

  "Shit," Larry said. I couldn't have agreed more.

  The headlights roared up onto Jeremy Ruebens, and he threw himself to one side. There was the sound of brushing cloth as his coat slid along the car's side. Close, damn close.

  Larry picked up speed and swung us around the last corner and into the last straight stretch. We spilled out onto the highway in a shower of gravel and spinning tires. But we were out of the cemetery. We'd made it. Thank you, God.

  Larry's hands were white on the steering wheel. "You can ease down now," I said. "We're safe."

  He swallowed hard enough for me to hear it, then nodded. The car started gradually approaching the speed limit. His face was beaded with sweat that had nothing to do with the cool October evening.

  "You alright?"

  "I don't know." His voice sounded sort of hollow. Shock.

  "You did good back there."

  "I thought I was going to run over him. I thought I was going to kill him with the car."

  "He thought so, too, or he wouldn't have moved," I said.

  He looked at me. "What if he hadn't moved?"

  "He did move."

  "But what if he hadn't?"

  "Then we would have gone over him, and we'd still be on the highway, safe."

  "You would have let me run him down, wouldn't you?"

  "Survival is the name of the game, Larry. If you can't deal with that, find another business to be in."

  "Animators don't get shot at."

  "Those were members of Humans First, a right-wing fanatic group that hates anything to do with the supernatural." So I was leaving out about the personal visit from Jeremy Ruebens. What the kid didn't know might not hurt him.

  I stared at his pale face. He looked hollow-eyed. He'd met the dragon, a little dragon as dragons go, but once you've seen violence, you're never the same again. The first time you have to decide, live or die, us or them, it changes you forever. No going back. I stared at Larry's shocked face and wished it could have been different. I wished I could have kept him shining, new, and hopeful. But as my Grandmother Blake used to say, "If wishes were horses, we'd all ride."

  Larry had had his first taste of my world. The only question was, would he want a second dose, or would he run? Run or go, stay or fight, age-old questions. I wasn't sure which way I wanted Larry to choose. He might live longer if he got the hell away from me, but then again maybe he wouldn't. Heads they win, tails you lose.

  21

  "WHAT ABOUT MY CAR?" Larry asked.

  I shrugged. "You've got insurance, right?"

  "Yes, but . . ."

  "Since they couldn't trash us, they may decide to trash your car."

  He looked at me as if he wasn't sure whether I was kidding. I wasn't.

  There was a bicyc
le in front of us suddenly, out of the dark. A child's pale face flashed in the headlights. "Watch out!"

  Larry's eyes flicked back to the road in time to see the kid's wide, startled eyes. The brakes squealed, and the child vanished from the narrow arch of lights. There was a crunch and a bump before the car skidded to a stop. Larry was breathing heavy; I wasn't breathing at all.

  The cemetery was just on our right. We were too close to stop, but . . . but, shit, it was a kid.

  I stared out the back window. The bicycle was a crumpled mess. The child lay in a very still heap. God, please don't let him be dead.

  I didn't think Humans First had enough imagination to have a child in reserve as bait. If it was a trap, it was a good one, because I couldn't leave the tiny figure crumpled by the road.

  Larry was gripping the steering wheel so hard his arms shook. If I thought he'd been pale before, I'd been wrong. He looked like a sick ghost.

  "Is he . . . hurt?" His voice squeezed out deep and rough with something like tears. It wasn't hurt he'd wanted to say. He just couldn't bring himself to use the big "D" word. Not yet, not if he could help it.

  "Stay in the car," I said.

  Larry didn't answer. He just sat there staring at his hands. He wouldn't look at me. But, dammit, this wasn't my fault. The fact that he'd lost his cherry tonight was not my fault. So why did it feel like it was?

  I got out of the car, Browning ready in case the crazies decided to chase us onto the road. They could have gotten the .45 and be coming to shoot us. The child hadn't moved. I was just too far away to see the chest rise and fall. Yeah, that was it. I was maybe a yard away.

  Please be alive.

  The child lay sprawled on his stomach, one arm trapped underneath, probably broken. I scanned the dark cemetery as I knelt by the child. No right-wing crazies came swarming out of the darkness. The child was dressed in the proverbial little boy's outfit of striped shirt, shorts, and tiny running shoes. Who had sent him out dressed for summer on this cold night? His mother. Had some woman dressed him, loved him, sent him out to die?

  His curly brown hair was silken, baby-fine. The skin of his neck was cool to the touch. Shock? It was too soon to be cold from death. I waited for the big pulse in his neck, but nothing happened. Dead. Please, God, please.

  His head raised up, and a soft sound came out of his mouth. Alive. Thank you, God.

  He tried to roll over but fell back against the road. He cried out.

  Larry was out of the car, coming towards us. "Is he alright?"

  "He's alive," I said.