Dead Beat

Chapter Thirty-eight

I didn't wake up.

It was more like I felt myself putting together some kind of awareness, the way a stagehand constructs a set. Evidently I was a minimalist, because the reality I awoke to was a bare black floor, a single hanging lamp overhead, and three chairs.

I walked forward into the light and stared at the chairs.

In one sat Lasciel, again in her angelic, blond, wholesome form. She wasn't wearing the white tunic, though. Instead, she was clothed in an Illinois Department of Corrections prison jumpsuit. The orange suited her hair and complexion quite well. She wore prison shackles, wrists and feet, and sat primly in her chair.

In the second chair was me. Well. It was a version of me, some kind of subconscious alter ego of mine. His hair was clipped shorter and neater than mine, and he wore a dark beard that was kept in similar fastidious order. He wore a black silk shirt, black trousers, and his hands (both of them) were unmarred, his fingertips held together in a steeple that rested on his chin.

"Another dream," I said, and sighed. I slumped down into the third chair. I looked more or less as I had when I woke up that morning. My shirt was slashed open, though there wasn't any blood on my torso, and my skin hadn't been pounded and ripped with a chain. Wishful thinking.

"Not precisely a dream," the subconscious me said. "Call it a meeting of the minds."

Lasciel smiled, very slightly.

"No," I said, and pointed at Lasciel. "I've said everything I intend to say to her." I turned to my alter ego-though on thinking about it, maybe alter id was more accurate. "As for you, you're sort of a jerk. And the whole look you've got going there says 'evil wizard,' which I am now professionally opposed to."

Alterna- Harry sighed. "I've told you before. I'm not some sort of dark demon. I'm simply the more primal essence of yourself. The one most concerned with such matters as food. Survival." His dark eyes flickered idly over Lasciel. "Mating," he said, a lazy growl to the tone. He looked back to me. "The important things in life."

"That I am even having this dream probably means that I need a good therapist," I said. I stared at my other self and said, "It was you, wasn't it? You wanted to pick up the coin."

"Make sure you remember that I am a part of you before you point any fingers," he said. "And yes. The potential for power in an alliance with Lasciel"-he inclined his head to her, a courtly, gentlemanly gesture, damn his chivalrous eyes-"was too great to simply ignore. There are too many things out there determined to kill you. So long as you keep Lasciel's coin, you both have the option to seek more power if necessary to protect yourself or others, and you prevent the coin from being used by unscrupulous sorts like Cassius."

I grimaced. "So?"

"So," he said. "This is a time to consider employing a portion of that power."

I stared at him and said, "You've been talking to her behind my back."

"For months," he said calmly. "It was only polite. After all, you wanted nothing to do with her."

"You asshole," I said. "The whole reason I wasn't talking was that I didn't want the temptation."

"I did," my subconscious said. "Honestly, you should listen to me more often. If you'd taken my advice about Murphy, she wouldn't be in Hawaii. In bed with Kincaid."

Lasciel coughed gently and said, "Gentlemen. If I might offer a suggest-"

Both I and my alternative self said, at the same time and in exactly the same voice, "Shut up."

Lasciel blinked, but did.

My double and I eyed each other, and I nodded slowly. "We're in agreement, then, that her presence and her influence are dangerous."

"We are," my double said. "She must not be allowed to dictate actions or to direct our choices through suggestion or manipulation." My double looked at her and said, "But she can and should be used as a resource, under careful control. She can offer us enormous amounts of information." He eyed her again and said, "And amusement."

Lasciel left her eyes down and smiled, very slightly.

"No," I said. "I've got Bob when I want information. And if I want sex, I'll… figure out something."

"You don't have Bob now," my double said. "And you've wanted sex since about twenty minutes after the last time you had it."

"That's beside the point," I told him sullenly. "I'm not quite insane enough to let a fallen angel give me virtual nooky, just for kicks."

"Listen to me," he said, and his voice became sharp, commanding. "Here's the cold truth. You are determined to take us into battle against forces you cannot possibly overcome through main strength. Not only that, but your source of assistance, the Wardens, may also turn against you if they learn the truth about what you're attempting. You are wounded. You are out of contact with your other allies."

"It's the right thing to do," I said, setting my jaw.

My double rolled his eyes. "Tell me, is it morally necessary for you to die in the process?"

I glowered at him.

"This meeting is just a formality, you know," he said. "You are already planning on asking Lasciel's shadow for her help. That's why you read through the book as you did before it was taken from you. You wanted it to go through your mind so that she could see it, and provide you with the text as she did for the summoning of the Erlking."

I lifted a finger. "I only did that in case I wasn't able to pry enough out of Grevane to figure out exactly what Kemmler's disciples are doing."

My double arched a brow. "How'd that work out for you?"

"Don't be a wiseass," I said.

"The point," he said, "is that you have little or no chance to prevail if you blindly rush in. You must know how they intend to manipulate these energies. You must know if there is a weak time or place at which to assault them. You must know the details of the Darkhallow, or you might as well cut your own wrists."

"Don't have to," I told him. "I could just sit and wait for the Erlking to come by."

"Six of one, half a dozen of another," my double agreed. "In addition, your body is in no condition to do anything at the moment." He leaned forward. "Free her to help us."

I inhaled slowly and stared at Lasciel for a moment. Then I said, "After I killed Justin and got my head together at Ebenezar's place, I promised myself something. I promised that I would live my life on my own terms. That I knew the difference between right and wrong and that I wouldn't cross the line. I wouldn't allow myself to become like Justin DuMorne."

"Don't you want to survive?" my double asked.

I rose from the chair and started walking into the darkness outside the light. "Of course I do. But some things are more important than survival."

"Yeah," my double said. "Like the people who are going to get killed when you die and don't stop Kemmler's disciples."

I froze at the edge of the darkness.

"Take the high road if you want to," my double said. "Choose to walk away from this strength in the name of principle. But after your noble death, everyone you no longer protect, everyone who might one day have come to you for help, everyone who is killed in the aftermath of the Darkhallow-every life you might have protected in the future will be on your head."

I stared at the darkness and then closed my eyes.

"Regardless of where it came from, Lasciel offers you the power of knowledge. If you turn aside from that power-power only you can take up-then you abandon your commitment to protect and defend those who are not strong enough to do it themselves."

"No," I said. "That isn't… that isn't my responsibility."

"Of course it is," my subconscious said, voice clear and sharp. "You coward."

I stopped and turned, staring at him.

"If you go to your death rather than do everything you might to prevent what is happening, you are merely committing suicide and trying to make yourself feel better about it. That is the act of a coward. It is beneath contempt."

I went through the logic of his argument and didn't make any headway against it-of course. While my double might look like another person, he wasn't. He was me.

"If I open this door now," I said slowly. "I might not be able to close it again."

"Or you might," my double said. "I have no intention of allowing her any control. So you will be the one who determines it."

"What if I can't contain her again once she is freed?"

"Why shouldn't you be able to? It's your mind. Your will. Your choice. You still believe in free will, do you not?"

"It's dangerous," I said.

"Of course it is. And now you must choose. Will you face that danger? Or will you run from it, and so condemn those who need your strength to their deaths?"

I stared at him for a minute. Then I looked at Lasciel. She waited, her eyes steady, her expression calm.

"Can you do it?" I asked her bluntly. "Can you show me what was on those pages?"

"Of course," she answered, her manner one of subservience without a trace of resentment. "I would be pleased to offer you whatever assistance you permit."

She looked humble. She looked cooperative. But I knew better. The mere shadow of the fallen angel Lasciel was a vital and powerful force. She might look humble and cooperative, but if that was her true nature she wouldn't have fallen to begin with. I didn't think she was harboring murderous impulses or anything-my instincts told me that she was genuinely pleased to help me.

After all, that was the first step. And she had patience. She could afford to wait.

Dangerous indeed. Lasciel represented nothing less than the intrinsic allure of power itself. I had never sought to become a wizard. Hell, a lot of the time I thought about how nice things might be if I hadn't been one. The power had been a birthright, and if it had grown since then, it had done so by the necessity of survival. But I'd tasted a darker side to the possession of power-the searing satisfaction of seeing an enemy fall to my strength. The lust to test myself against another, to challenge them and see who was the strongest. The mindless hunger for more that, if once indulged, might never be slaked.

One of the coldest, most evil souls I have ever encountered once told me that the reason I fought so hard to do what seemed right was that I was terrified to look within me and see the desire to cease the fight and do as I would, free of conscience or remorse.

And now I could see that he had been right.

I looked at the fallen angel, patiently waiting, and was terrified.

But there were innocent lives at stake: men and women and children who needed protection.

If I didn't give it to them, who would?

I took a deep breath, reached into my pocket, and found a silver key there. I threw it to my double.

He caught it and rose. Then he unlocked Lasciel's shackles.

Lasciel inclined her head to him respectfully. Then she walked over to me, gorgeous and warm in the harsh light, her eyes lowered. Without a trace of self-consciousness, she sank down to her knees, bowed her head, and said, "How may I serve you, my host?"

I opened my eyes and found myself on my back. There was a candle burning nearby. Mouse had curled himself protectively around my head, and his tongue was nicking over my face, rough and wet and warm.

I hurt absolutely everywhere. I'd learned to block out pain under the harsh lessons of Justin DuMorne, but it went only so far.

Lasciel had shown me a different technique.

I couldn't have explained to anyone what I did. I wasn't sure that I understood it myself, at least on a conscious level. I simply knew. I gathered the pain together and fed it into a burning fire of determination in my thoughts, and it began to steadily recede.

I exhaled slowly and began to sit up. My brain registered the screaming torture of the muscles in my stomach-it just wasn't horribly important, and took up little of my attention.

"My God, Harry," Butters said. His voice was thick and slurred, as if he were holding his nose. His hand pushed on my shoulder. "Don't sit up."

I let him push me back down. I needed a couple of minutes to let the pain continue to fade. "How bad is it?"

He exhaled. "It's pretty hideous, but I don't think he actually perforated the abdominal wall. Skin and tissue damage, but you did some bleeding." He swallowed and looked a little green around the gills. "That's my best guess, anyway."

"You okay?"

"Yeah. Yeah, fine. It's just… I work with corpses because I just couldn't handle… you know… actual living people."

"Heh. You can eat lunch while looking at a three-month-old corpse, but first aid on my stomach is too much to handle?"

"Yeah. I mean, you're still alive. That's just weird."

I shook my head. "How long was I out?" I was surprised at how calm and steady my voice sounded.

"It's been about fifteen minutes," Butters said. "I found some bandages and alcohol in the old man's duffel bag. I've got your belly cleaned and covered, but I don't have much of an idea of how much trouble you're in. You need a hospital."

"Maybe later," I said. I lay on my back, poring over what Lasciel had given me about the writings in the book. Hell, the thing had been written in German. I didn't know German, but Lasciel had translated the text about the Darkhallow. It felt like we had talked about it for an hour or more, but dream time and real time aren't always lockstepped.

Butters's nose had swollen up. There was still some blood on his face, and he already had a matched set of gorgeously colorful black eyes. He leaned over and fussed with the bandages on my stomach.

"Hey," I said quietly. "I told you to run. I was doing that heroic rearguard thing. You screwed it all up."

"Sorry," he answered, his voice serious. "But… I got outside and I couldn't run. I mean, I wanted to. I really wanted to. But after all you've done for me…" He shook his head. "I just couldn't do that."

"What did you do?"

"I ran around the outside of the museum. I tried to find help, but with all the rain and the dark there wasn't anyone around. So I ran to the car and got Mouse. I thought that maybe he could help you."

"He could," I agreed. "He did."

Mouse's tail thumped on the floor, and he kept on licking at my head. I realized, dully, that he was cleaning the dozens of tiny snakebites.

"But he couldn't have done it without you, Butters," I said. "You saved my life. Another five minutes and I'd have been history."

He blinked down at me for a moment and then said, "I did, didn't I?"

"Damned brave of you," I said.

His spine straightened a little. "You think?"

"Yeah."

"And check it out," he said, gesturing at his face, his mouth opening into a toothy smile. "I have a broken nose, don't I?"

"Absolutely," I said.

"Like I'm a boxer. Or maybe a tough-as-nails gumshoe."

"You earned it," I said. "Hurt?"

"Like hell," he said, but he was still smiling. He blinked a few times, the gears almost visibly spinning in his head, and said, "I didn't run away. And I fought him. I jumped on him."

I kept quiet and let him process it.

"My God," he said. "That was… that was so stupid."

"Actually, when you survive it gets reclassified as 'courageous.'" I reached out my right hand. Butters shook it, gripping hard.

He looked at Cassius's body, and his smile faded. "What about him?" he asked.

"He's done," I said.

"That's not what I mean."

"Oh," I said. "We'll leave the body here. No time to move it. He'll be a John Doe on the public records, and there probably won't be a heavy investigation. If we get out quick it shouldn't be an issue."

"No. I mean… I mean, my God, he's dead. We killed him."

"Don't kid yourself," I told him. "I'm the one who killed him. All you did was try to help me."

His brow furrowed and he shook his head. "That's not what I mean either. I feel sorry for him."

"Don't," I said. "He was a monster."

Butters frowned and nodded. "But he was also a man. Or was once. He was so bitter. So much hate. He had a horrible life."

"Note the past tense," I said. "Had."

Butters looked away from the corpse. "What happened there at the very end? There was a light, and his voice sounded… weird. I thought he'd killed you."

"He hit me with his death curse," I said.

Butters swallowed. "I guess it didn't work? I mean, because you're breathing."

"It worked," I told him. I'd felt that vicious magic grab hold of me and sink in. "I don't think he was strong enough to kill me outright. So he went for something else."

" 'Die alone'?" Butters asked quietly. "What does that mean?"

"I don't know," I said. "Not sure I want to." I took a deep breath and then exhaled. I didn't have enough time to lie there waiting to recover. "Butters, I don't have any right to ask this of you. I'm already in your debt. But I need your help."

"You have it," he said.

"I haven't even told you what it is," I said.

Butters smiled a little and nodded. "I know. But you have it."

I felt my lips peel back from my teeth in a fierce grin. "One little assault and you've gone habitual. Next thing I know you'll be forming a fight club. Help me up."

"You shouldn't," he said seriously.

"No choice," I said.

He nodded and then stood up and offered me his hand. I took it and rose, waiting to sway or pass out or throw up from the pain. I did none of those things. The pain was there, but it didn't stop me from moving or thinking. Butters just stared at me and then shook his head.

I found my staff, picked it up, and walked to the Buffalo Bill exhibit. Butters got the candle, and then he and Mouse kept pace. I looked around for a second, then picked up a long, heavy-duty extension cord running from an outlet on the wall to power some lights on an exhibit in the center of the room. I jerked it clear at both ends and gathered it into a neat loop. Once I had it, I passed it to Butters.

"What are you doing?" he asked.

"Preparing," I said. "I found out about the Darkhallow."

Butters blinked. "You did? How?"

I grunted. "Magic."

"Okay," he said. "What did you learn?"

"That this isn't a rite. It's a big spell," I said. "It all depends on drawing together a ton of dark spiritual energy."

"Like what?" he asked.

"Like a lot of things. The necromantic energy around animated corpses and manifested shades. The predatory spirits of ancient hunters. All the fear that's been growing since last night. Plus, the past several years have seen some serious magical turbulence around Chicago. Kemmler's disciples can put that turbulence to work for them, too."

"Then what?"

"They gather it together and get it going in a big circle. It creates a kind of vortex, which then funnels down into whoever is trying to consume the energy. Poof. Insta-god."

He frowned. "I'm not very clued in on this magic stuff, but that sounds kind of dangerous."

"Hell, yeah," I said, and crossed the room to a rack of riding equipment. "It's like trying to inhale a tornado."

"Holy crap," Butters said. "But how does that help us?"

"First of all, I found out that the vortex itself is deadly. It's going to draw off the life of every living thing around it."

Butters gulped. "It will kill everything?"

"Not at first. But when the wizard at the vortex draws down the power, it's going to create a kind of vacuum where all that power used to be. The vacuum will rip away the life energy of everything within a mile."

"Dear God. That will kill thousands of people."

"Only if they finish the spell," I said. "Until then, the farther back you are from it, the less it will do," I said. "But to get near the vortex, the only way to survive it is to surround yourself with necromantic energy of your own."

"Only those with ghosts or zombies need apply?" he asked.

"Exactly." I lifted a saddle from the rack. Then I got a second one. I hung both over opposite ends of my staff, and picked it up like a plowman's yoke, the saddles hanging. I started walking down the stairs.

"But wait," Butters said. "What are you going to do?"

"Get to the center of the vortex," I said. "The effort it will take to work this spell is incredible. I don't care how good Cowl is. If I hit him as he tries to draw down the vortex, it's going to shake his concentration. The spell will be ruined. The backlash will kill him."

"And everyone will be all right?" he asked.

"That's the plan."

He nodded and then stopped abruptly in his tracks. I felt his stare burning into my back.

"But, Harry. To get there you'll have to call up the dead yourself."

I stopped and looked over my shoulder at him.

Comprehension dawned in his eyes. "And you need a drummer."

"Yeah."

He swallowed. "Could… could you get in trouble with your people for doing this?"

"It's possible," I said. "But there's a technicality I can exploit."

"What do you mean?"

"The Laws of Magic specifically refer to the abuse of magic when used against our fellow human beings. Technically it only counts if you call up human corpses."

"But you told me that everyone only calls humans."

"Right. So while the Laws of Magic only address necromancy as used on human corpses, there usually isn't any need for a distinction. Nutty necromancers only call up humans. Sane wizards don't touch necromancy at all. I don't think anyone has tried something like this."

We reached the main level of the museum.

"It's going to be dangerous," I told him. "I think we can do it, but I can't make you any promises. I don't know if I can protect you."

Butters walked beside me for several steps, his expression serious. "You can't try it without someone's help. And if you don't stop it, the spell will kill thousands of people."

"Yes," I said. "But I can't order you to help me. I can only ask."

He licked his lips. "I can keep a beat," he said.

I nodded and reached my destination. I slipped my improvised yoke off my shoulders and dropped both saddles to the floor. My breathing was a little harsh from the effort, even though I barely noticed the pain and strain. "You'll need a drum."

Butters nodded. "There were some tom-toms upstairs. I'll go get one."

I shook my head. "Too high-pitched. Your polka suit is still in the Beetle's trunk, right?"

"Yes."

I nodded. Then I looked up. And up. And up. Another flash of lightning illuminated the pale, towering terror of Sue, the most complete Tyrannosaurus skeleton mankind has ever discovered.

"Okay, Butters." I told him. "Go get it."