Dark War

NINE

We were only a couple of blocks from Varvara's stronghold when Scorch announced that she had to use the little demons' room. When I just looked at her, she said, "What? My natural form may be big, but when I'm in this shape, my bladder isn't much larger than a pea."

I wanted to ask her why demons needed to urinate at all, but I decided there are some things which, despite my naturally inquisitive nature, I'm better off not knowing. We stopped at at a Sawney B's, and Scorch entered the faux cave exterior in order to use the restaurant's restroom. Considering that the place is named after the infamous Scottish cannibal and serves fast-food items like lady fingers, marrow shakes, and homunculus nuggets, I hate to think what the restroom conditions are like. Darkfolk or human, one thing that unites both species is that females for some unknown reason seem compelled to visit restrooms in packs. Once we'd stopped, Devona decided she needed to go too, and she asked Shamika if she wanted to come along. The girl looked confused for a moment, as if she was unsure how to respond, but then she nodded and followed Devona inside the restaurant, leaving Varney and me to wait outside.

I leaned back against Sawney B's plastic cave wall and crossed my arms over my chest. Thanks to Papa Chatha's spell, I was managing to keep my various body parts holding together, but it took constant concentration. If I allowed my mind to wander too far, I would feel myself start to lose cohesion, and I had to be careful if I didn't want to go all to pieces again. The warlock's spell had severed my head, arms, hands, legs, and feet from my body. I felt more like a scarecrow than I did a zombie, with joints that could bend in any direction, and movements so loosey-goosey I felt like a comical marionette whose strings were being pulled by a half-drunken puppeteer. Papa had told me that the enchantment that allowed me to keep a severed piece of myself attached to my body would remain effective for about twenty-four hours. But he hadn't said anything about trying to keep multiple severed body parts attached. I wondered how long I would be able to keep up my scarecrow act before I fell apart and stayed that way. I didn't think I was in any danger of being a permanent collection of undead puzzle pieces, not as long as I could find a magic-user to fix me up – or I could always pay a visit on Victor Baron. He once reattached my head, and he could easily do the same for the rest of me. But I didn't want to take time out for repairs. I wanted to find Papa and the rest of the magic-users and stop the conflict between Talaith and Varvara before it erupted into all-out war.

I was grateful for the women's need to take a pit stop, though, for it gave me a chance to be alone with Varney. I had a few questions I wanted to ask my vampiric shadow.

Varney stood next to me, his head swiveling slowly back and forth as his gaze scanned the street.

"Filming?" I asked.

"Just some background footage," he said. "Never know when it'll come in handy. Not much going on here, though. The streets are practically deserted."

"We're close to Demon's Roost. If Varvara really is preparing for war, she's probably had her people cordon off the blocks around her stronghold."

"If that's so, then how will we get through?"

I smiled. "The same way I get through anything else. Boyish charm and rugged good looks."

Varney gave me a skeptical glance but didn't say anything.

"You were filming when we broke up the riot between the Arcane and the Demonkin, right? I mean, you're always filming, but I assume you were paying special attention then."

"Sure thing. I got some great stuff!"

"I bet you did. Did you happen to get any footage of Shamika being blasted by the warlock's spell?"

He frowned. "I think so. I can't review the footage mentally. I need a Mind's Eye set to transmit it to, but yeah, I think I shot that. Why?"

"Just curious. Curiosity is one of the prime qualities of a good private detective, you know. For example, I'm curious about you, Varney."

"Me?"

"You saved Devona from falling when the rest of the Bridge of Nine Sorrows collapsed. And you pulled her out of the way when the warlock tried to blast her. Don't get me wrong: I'm very thankful that you did, but I find it awfully convenient that you should just happen to be in the right place at the right time… twice."

He shrugged. "Just lucky, I guess."

"Maybe. Except I don't really believe in luck, Varney. You know what I do believe in? People with hidden agendas who pretend to be something they aren't."

Varney looked at me for a long moment. "Dude, you are way cynical. You need to cultivate a more positive outlook. I know a guy who teaches meditation to Bloodborn to help them control their thirst-rage. Maybe you should give him a call sometime."

"Or maybe you should just come clean and tell me what your game is."

Varney looked at me, and his organic eye narrowed in cold appraisal. For a moment I thought he might break down and tell me what I wanted to know, but then the women came out of the restaurant and rejoined us.

Devona held two cups with straws in them, and she handed one to Varney. "It's just aqua sanguis, but it should take the edge off your thirst."

Aqua sanguis is a synthetic blood substitute produced in the Sprawl. It tastes like blood but doesn't provide any nourishment. For the Darkfolk, it's like the equivalent of diet soda. From what I've been told, it tastes rather weak, hence the slang term for it: redwater. Devona's not against drinking real blood per se. Officially, humans aren't considered prey by law in Nekropolis, and any real blood served in bars and restaurants either comes from willing donors or from specially cloned donator bodies produced by Victor Baron. But that doesn't stop some of the more unscrupulous blood suppliers from snatching a human or two off the street now and again, and – like humans on Earth who boycott tuna because of fishing practices that ensnare dolphins – some of the more socially conscious Darkfolk choose to drink aqua sanguis instead of blood whenever possible.

Varney thanked Devona, took the drink, and sipped. He didn't look at me, and it was like our conversation hadn't happened. But it had, and I intended to continue it later. I was certain now that Varney was more than he appeared to be. The question was what, and whether he was any kind of a danger. So far he'd saved Devona twice, and that meant I was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt for the time being, but that wasn't the same as trusting him. Not by a long shot.

I desperately wanted a chance to talk with Devona alone for a few minutes. I had yet to tell her about my visit from Dis at Papa Chatha's, and I wanted to share my suspicions about Varney with her, as well as my uneasy feelings about Shamika. I could've done so telepathically, I suppose, but I've found that our link works best for sharing emotions. It's harder to communicate complex concepts, and short back-and-forth communication works better than longer, more detailed exchanges. I decided it would be better to wait until we had a few moments of privacy so we could speak aloud to one another. But if the opportunity didn't arise soon, I'd settle for a telepathic exchange rather than wait too much longer.

Instead of a drink, Scorch had bought a ten-pack of testicles marinated in gastric juices, and she popped one of the horrid slimy things in her mouth.

"Things are likely to get more military from here on out," she said as she chewed, "so you'd better let me do the talking."

"Maybe you should finish eating first," I said, and despite the fact that I no longer possessed a functioning sense of smell or working taste buds, I couldn't help sounding queasy.

"Good idea."

Scorch assumed her fire demon form, opened her now large maw, and tossed the rest of the testicles into her mouth, package and all, and swallowed. Then she grinned at me.

"I'm ready."

Scorch took the lead, Devona, Shamika and I walked in the middle, and Varney brought up the rear, the better to film us, no doubt. I noticed he kept closer to Devona than the rest of us, and given his track record at protecting her, I wasn't about to protest.

By this point we could see Demon's Roost off in the distance. Varvara's stronghold resembled a sleek, gleaming, metal-and-glass high-rise that would be right at home in one of Earth's more modern cities. It rose a dozen stories into the sky, its bright lights standing out sharply against the starless black expanse that stretches above the city like a vast blanket of Nothing. Cold and stark, utterly lacking charm or grace, Demon's Roost is a monstrous monument to power and excess – and thus a perfect home for the Demon Queen.

When we reached the next block, I saw that my supposition had been correct: the streets were blocked off by wicked-looking barriers made from large steel spikes with razor wire stretched between. Demons larger, more muscular, and way uglier than Scorch patrolled the barriers, armed to the teeth with weapons both modern and ancient. Some carried automatic pistols, rifles, and flamethrowers, while others gripped broadswords and heavy battleaxes. A few carried futuristic high-tech weapons that wouldn't have been out of place on the set of a scifi movie. Varvara believes in being on the cutting edge of everything, and that includes technology. She has the means and the money to import any Earth weaponry she wishes, and there are any number of mad scientists living in the city who are only too happy to provide some seriously deadly upgrades to the toys she acquires – for a price. And if they don't already work for the Demon Queen, she has them on retainer. And since Darkfolk are tougher than humans, safety features like radiation shielding aren't necessary, and if a weapon should blow up in a demon's hands, what of it? They'll more than likely shrug it off, and if the explosion does manage to kill them, there are a hundred more waiting in line to serve, and more are being bred in Varvara's hatcheries every day. Back on Earth, some people say life is cheap, but they've never been to Nekropolis.

The guard demons fixed wary gazes on us as we approached, but they didn't raise their weapons. I guess we looked like a harmless enough bunch – and we did have our very own demon escort.

Scorch walked up to the barrier and addressed one of the demons, a mammoth creature ten feet tall that looked like a giant ape covered in snakeskin.

"Hey, Magilla. What's up?"

The ape-thing carried a weapon that resembled a giant blow dryer combined with a food processor. It looked ridiculous, which most likely meant it was exceptionally lethal.

Magilla tightened his grip on the weapon and raised it a few inches, but he still didn't level it at us, something for which I was profoundly grateful.

"Guard duty," the demon said in a low rumbling voice that sounded like a small avalanche. "The general's ordered all access points to Demon's Roost blocked off and guarded."

"General who?" I asked.

Magilla looked at me as if he was considering gutting me and using my eviscerated corpse for a field latrine. But he said, "General Klamm. Varvara put him in charge."

"She's already gathering an army?" Devona asked.

Magilla shrugged. "You know Varvara. Once she decides to do something, it's fast forward all the way."

"The bridges weren't destroyed by ground troops," I pointed out.

In response, Magilla hooked a thumb skyward. I looked up and saw a dozen winged demons flying above us. Some had bat wings, some had insect wings, and some just levitated, but, like their groundbased counterparts, they were all armed and ready for trouble.

"Looks like Klamm's thought of everything," I said.

"He's a pretty smart guy," Magilla agreed affably enough, though from our conversation so far, I figured he wasn't the greatest judge of intelligence levels. He went on. "What are you doing here, Scorch? You come to enlist?"

Scorch said, "Naw. You know me. I'm a lover, not a fighter."

Scorch's assertion was a bit hard to take considering that she now looked like something Hieronymus Bosch would've hesitated to paint, but it made Magilla laugh, and whenever a soldier is laughing instead of blasting you with his futuristic super-weapon, that's a good thing.

Scorch went on. "I've got some people here that need to talk to Varvara. This is Matthew Richter, the zombie PI. He has some information that might prove useful to the queen."

I was coming to ask questions of Varvara, not deliver information, but I didn't see the need to correct Scorch, not if her ruse would get us past the guard.

"I heard you've been hanging around him lately." Magilla gave me an appraising look with his simian eyes. "You can't mistake the smell, can you? Nothing reeks quite like a deader."

I frowned, but I held my tongue. I was tempted to draw my 9mm and put a couple bullets in the big scaly ape just to show him that I don't take shit from anyone, but I told myself that, satisfying as it might be, it wouldn't help matters – especially when Magilla decided to retaliate with a deadly blast from his Buck Rogers gun.

Magilla thought for a moment, and from the way his brow crinkled and the little grunts of effort he made, I knew it wasn't an easy task for him.

"I guess it's OK if you take the deader on to Demon's Roost," he said at last. "Everyone knows Varvara finds him amusing, and she could probably use a good laugh right now."

"Looks like my reputation has preceded me," I muttered.

Magilla's scaly lips drew back in a grin, exposing a mouthful of large yellowed fangs. "And if she's not in the mood to see you, she'll probably just blast you to atoms."

"Always a risk when you seek an audience with the Demon Queen," I agreed.

Magilla's grin fell away, and I had the impression he was disappointed that I hadn't found him intimidating. Monsters are like that. They're so used to being terrifying that when you don't automatically pee your pants at the sight of them, they're at a loss for what to do next. Usually they just try to kill you. And failing that, they try to scare anyone else in the vicinity. Magilla was no different. He turned away from me and focused his attention on Devona, Shamika, and Varney. He grinned again, wider this time.

"What about these three, Scorch?" he asked. "Who are they and why should I let them through?"

"They're friends," Scorch said, "and they also have information that might be of interest to Varvara."

Magilla looked them up and down for a moment. "I don't see that it takes five of you to talk to the queen, but I'll tell you what. You give me the girl to play with, and I'll let the rest of you pass." Magilla's grin widened into a full-fledged leer.

Shamika's eyes widened in shock, and Devona stepped closer to her and put a protective arm around her shoulders.

"We will do no such thing! I can't believe you'd even make such a suggestion!" Devona's eyes flashed dangerously.

Magilla laughed. "What part of 'I'm a demon' don't you understand?"

"No deal," I said.

Magilla shrugged. "Then none of you pass. It's as simple as that. Now go on and get out of here before I decide to use you all for target practice."

I fixed Magilla with the sort of unblinking stare that only dead people like me are capable of.

"I pick up a lot of nifty toys in my line of work," I said in what I hoped was a low, dangerous tone. "One of the nastier ones I've got is called a Judas bomb. Ever heard of it?"

Magilla shook his head. He didn't look especially scared, but he was paying attention.

"It's a magical device that when activated causes half the cells in your body to become cannibalistic. They immediately turn on the unaffected cells and begin devouring them. In a sense, your body betrays itself, hence the device's name. It's an extremely messy and unbelievably painful way to die."

Magilla smiled, but it was forced. "And what? If I say anything more about wanting to play with the little girlie you'll use the bomb on me? Just kill me in cold blood? I thought you hero types were better than that."

I kicked myself mentally for trying to bluff Magilla. It's almost impossible to out-nasty a demon. Of course, it would've helped if I'd actually had a Judas bomb on me. I'd heard of the devices but never actually saw one. If I'd had one, I'd have probably used it then, just to wipe the smug smile off Magilla's face and to hell with my heroic reputation.

Shamika stepped up next to me. "Thank you for trying to defend my honor, Matt, but I can take care of myself."

Magilla leered at her and a thick ropey strand of saliva dripped out of the corner of his mouth. "The question is, can you take care of me?"

The other guard demons had kept their distance so far, but they'd been watching our conversation with interest, and they burst out with laughter upon hearing the simian demon's less-than-subtle innuendo.

Shamika wasn't amused, however.

"Yes," she said softly. "I can."

She spoke no magic words, made no mystic gestures. She did nothing more than stand and stare at Magilla.

We heard the sounds first – a soft scritch-scratch of tiny claws on pavement coming from both sides of the street. We sensed movement next, shadows roiling and surging within the alleys between buildings. And then the shadows broke free and flooded into the street. Packs of small creatures ran out of the alleys and scampered on tiny legs toward Magilla, and the other guard demons shrieked when they saw the creatures. For they belonged to a species so savage, so remorseless that even monsters feared them, and with damn good reason.

They were chiranha.

No one knows where they came from, whether they're the result of some unnatural twist of evolution or the unexpected outcome of some bizarre magical or scientific experiment. No one believes they were created on purpose, though. There isn't a sorcerer or scientist insane enough to even contemplate such a thing, let alone actually do it. Chiranha are a cross between piranha and Chihuahua, and as silly as that might sound, no one in Nekropolis laughs at them. They're the city's ultimate predator-scavengers, and the only good thing about them is that they keep the carrion imp population under control.

They're the size of Chihuahuas, but scaled instead of furred, with beady black fish eyes and blunt piranha faces with a prominent lower jaw. Their teeth are tiny but razor sharp, and a pack of the little bastards can strip the flesh off your bones and start digesting it before your last scream has time to fade away.

Magilla shrieked at the sight of two packs of chiranha converging on him, sounding more like a young girl than Shamika. He aimed his futuristic blow dryer at the oncoming horde of miniature yapping death and unleashed a sizzling blast of glowing blue-white energy. The discharge disintegrated a huge chunk of the street, but the chiranha were too fast. They darted out of the beam's path just in time, without getting so much as a single fishy scale on their hides singed. The other guard demons let loose with their weapons, both mundane and esoteric, but with the same lack of success. The savage little bastards were just too small, fast, and agile. Fortunately for the other demons, they were only interested in Magilla. The chiranha were on him before he could fire his weapon a second time, and they swiftly covered the shrieking demon from head to toe. He fell to the ground, rolling and thrashing as he tried to fend off the chiranha, but no matter what he did, he couldn't dislodge the creatures.

All we could do was watch and wait for the inevitable to be over – or so I thought.

"Stop fussing," Shamika said. "They won't eat you unless I tell them to."

She had to repeat this several more times at increasingly louder volume, but eventually Magilla heard her and ceased his exertions. He lay motionless on the ground, the chiranha still covering his body, glaring at him with those tiny black eyes and growling softly. Shamika didn't say anything, but the chiranha covering Magilla's face moved away so he could see her.

The other guards, seeing that Magilla was, surprisingly enough, still alive, edged toward us, slowly raising their weapons.

I looked at them. "If she can summon chiranha to attack Magilla, what else do you think she might summon to attack you?"

The guards looked at me uncertainly, then at each other. Finally they shrugged and lowered their weapons. Demonkin aren't exactly a sentimental lot, and the others' concern for Magilla's fate didn't override their own survival instincts.

Shamika looked through the barrier at Magilla. "It's not nice to threaten people. Don't do it again."

Magilla looked at her as if she'd suddenly started speaking Urdu. Threatening people was one of the things demons like him did best.

"Um… OK. I'm… sorry?"

Before Shamika could respond, Devona gently nudged me. "We've got problems upstairs, Matt."

I directed my gaze skyward and saw a score of flying demons descending toward us. They'd doubtless witnessed what Shamika had done to Magilla, and while I doubted they gave anything remotely resembling a damn for him, they'd been assigned to guard the environs around Demon's Roost, and they weren't about to allow our aggression to go unchallenged. Now I really wished I had a Judas bomb – better yet, a few dozen. I was desperately trying to figure out what we could do to keep from being reduced to bloody gobs of shredded and sizzling flesh, when an image appeared in the air just above the barrier.

Varvara might be queen of all the Demonkin, but she looks human – with the exception of her emerald eyes which seem a bit too large and a bit too green to be real. But her humanity is an almost cartoonish representation of femininity. She's more gorgeous than any supermodel, more sexy than any Penthouse centerfold, with a body whose proportions would make a Barbie doll so sick with envy that she'd develop an eating disorder. She's statuesque in every sense of the word, with long full-bodied red hair that seems to glow with an inner fire. She usually dresses in the highest of high fashion, but today she was garbed in a military commander's outfit that looked vaguely Nazi-ish. Black fabric, black gloves, black boots, and a riding crop clasped in one hand held at her side. Her red hair was pulled back in a severe bun, and there was a stylized flame insignia over one of her extremely large breasts.

I knew we were looking at a magically projected image instead of the real thing because she was slightly transparent. Nevertheless, her image exuded the same psychic impression of Darklord power as her physical presence did, and it took an effort of will on my part not to take a step or two backward. No one else in our group did either – we were all a hardy bunch – but Scorch went down on one knee and bowed before her queen.

The flying demons that had been diving rapidly toward us stopped and hovered in mid attack, heads bowed, and Magilla's fellow guards did as Scorch had and knelt. Magilla, still covered by chiranha – who, I noticed, seemed oblivious to Varvara's presence – lay still, but the exaggerated relief on his face at seeing his mistress appear was almost comical.

"My queen!" he said, his voice more than a bit whiny. "These five attempted to breach the barrier and they've used Arcane magic to attack and insult me! I pray, Mistress, that you'll use your unholy powers to smite them for their transgression against your Infernal Majesty!"

I looked at Varvara. "He's laying it on a bit thick, don't you think?"

"More than a little, I'd say." Varvara scowled down at Magilla. "Get up. You look ridiculous lying there covered in carnivorous lapdogs. I swear, if I didn't need every able body to fight right now, I'd transform you into a school of catfish and let the chiranha have at you."

Magilla, far more terrified of his queen than he was of being devoured alive, leaped to his feet, scattering chiranha off him. The small creatures gave him a few last growls for good measure before turning away and padding back to the alleys from which they'd been summoned.

Varvara's image turned around to face the demon guards.

"Allow them through and escort them to Demon's Roost." She then turned her attention to Magilla once more. "And if any of them so much as stubs a toe on the way, I'll hold you personally responsible."

Magilla's scaly hide lightened a shade as he went pale. He tried unsuccessfully to speak, swallowed twice, and finally settled on a brisk nod. Varvara's image then turned back to us.

"So, Matt. I suppose you're coming to make my life even more hideously complicated than it already is."

"What else?" I said.

She smiled, said, "Sounds delicious," and then disappeared.

Varvara's parting words didn't exactly reassure me. When the Demon Queen says something sounds delicious, she might be speaking literally.