Nekropolis

TWELVE

I was pretty sure Varma was dead, but I looked to Devona-and her heightened senses-for confirmation. She nodded, her eyes moist with tears. I was surprised; I’d thought there was no love lost between Devona and her “cousin.”

Nekropolis has more than its fair share of scavengers. Stray dogs and cats brought from Earth as pets and then abandoned and left to fend for themselves. The poor animals often end up mutating into bizarre and dangerous forms upon repeated exposure to the strange magics coursing through the city. And there are rats, of courses, far larger and meaner than back home, if nowhere near the size and ferocity of vermen. But there are a number of home-grown varieties as well. Carrion imps are tiny, primitive versions of ghouls that scuttle about in their endless quest to fill their bellies with dead flesh. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been meditating in my bedroom and opened my eyes to find one or more of the little bastards gnawing on me. Leech vine is a vampiric plant that grows on buildings, especially in the Sprawl where no one bothers to kill it. There was some growing on the walls of the alley, but I wasn’t worried about it. Leech vine doesn’t move; it’s only dangerous if you’re foolish enough to brush up against it-and once it has you, if you can’t escape fast enough, it’ll drain you dry just as fast as a flesh vampire.

But one scavenger always gave me pause. It was one of the deadiest of the city’s bottom feeders, and a prime specimen was standing at the edge of the blood pool on four tiny legs, lapping daintily at the gore.

“What is that horrid thing?” Devona cried, and started toward the small creature, intending to scare it away from Varma’s body. I grabbed hold of her arm to keep her back.

“Don’t. That’s a chiranha. It’s alone, but if it calls for its pack, we’re done for.”

She looked at me with disbelief. “You can’t be serious! It’s so tiny!”

The creature under discussion raised its head, glared at us with beady black eyes, and let out a soft, highpitched growl. It resembled a small dog with short tan fur blended with fish scales, and its mouth was filled with rows of razor-sharp triangular teeth.

“Chiranha are either someone’s idea of a sick joke or the result of some very unnatural evolution, but either way, the damned things are dangerous as hell. Believe it or not, they’re a hybrid of chihuahua and piranha fish. They may look harmless at first glance, even adorable in their way, but get them in a pack, and they can strip the flesh from your bones within seconds. I once saw a pack take down a sasquatch-the poor sonofabitch didn’t even have time to scream.”

“Use your gun,” she said. “Fire a bullet in the air to scare it away.”

“The little fuckers are fearless,” I said. “Besides, I doubt he’d even hear the gunshot with all the noise coming from Sybarite Street. I could shoot him, but the one thing guaranteed to bring a pack of chiranha faster than a bark from one of their own is the smell of chiranha blood. They tend not to eat vampire flesh-not unless they’re really hungry, that is. Let’s just wait a minute. With any luck, this one will decide to go seek his dinner elsewhere.”

The chiranha growled at us a few seconds longer, before leaning down to sniff Varma’s blood once more. Then after giving us a parting glare to let us know it wasn’t afraid of us, the chiranha turned and padded off down the alley in the other direction.

“All right. It should be safe to approach now.”

I moved forward to examine Varma’s body, trying not to step in blood, unable to avoid it. He was thin, and shorter than I’d imagined. I realized that somehow I’d expected him to resemble Galm, even though he wasn’t the Darklord’s biological child. He was dressed in the white silken weave of spidermesh, a fashion popular in Nekropolis at the time, and one with partially technological origins-a rebellion against his bloodsire? Or just the latest in a series of trends he’d followed over the centuries? Or maybe he’d just liked the way it felt; Devona had said he was a hedonist.

From the back, there appeared to be no marks on the body to account for so much blood. I put my hands under Varma, intending to roll him over, but my damaged right arm refused to cooperate. I had no choice but to ask Devona to help me.

She did so, fighting tears, but when Varma’s bloodsmeared face was revealed, she lost the battle and sobbed.

His skin was bone-white, dry, and brittle like the castoff husk of a cicada. He stared lifelessly, eyes wide, whites completely red, pupils dilated so much they were practically nonexistent. His skin was white as polished bone. Dry, cracked lips had pulled away from his teeth to reveal sickly gray gum. The inside of his desiccated mouth was caked with blood-soaked clumps of whitish powder. Veinburn.

No sign of a wound on his front, either. I looked more closely.

“He overdosed on veinburn, didn’t he?” Devona asked as she wiped tears from her eyes. “When one of the Bloodborn’s blood supply is contaminated beyond the power of his system to cleanse it, his body casts it out-all of it-and unless he can replenish it within moments, he dies.”

“I didn’t know vampires could die of bloodloss. Interesting.”

She looked at me as if I had just slapped her. When she spoke, I thought she might yell at me, though I had no idea why she would want to. But all she said was, “It’s very rare.”

“Shrike said veinburn was an extremely powerful drug, but I’m not sure Varma did this to himself.”

“What do you mean?”

“The veinburn in his mouth. You said a vampire’s blood is poisoned, he has to get rid of it. I assume it would be vomited out.”

Devona’s expression became steely, and she wiped away the last of her tears. “Primarily.”

“Then why is there veinburn left in his mouth? Wouldn’t the blood have washed it away?”

Devona glared at me. She was obviously upset with me, but I still didn’t know why. “Perhaps it had been in his stomach and became lodged there, perhaps after he fell forward onto his face.”

“Maybe, but then why is it still partially white? With the all the blood Varma brought up, the veinburn should be completely soaked. And there are these.” I turned Varma’s forearm so Devona could see the five tiny puckered marks arranged in a half circle.

“They look like needle marks,” she said.

“They sure do, don’t they?”

“So perhaps Varma injected the veinburn.”

“Then why is there some caked in his mouth? And where’s the needle? There isn’t one lying around, and spidermesh is skin tight; no room for pockets. Not that Varma needed them. I assume that as the bloodchild of a Darklord, he could charge whatever he wanted to Galm’s account-when he just didn’t get things handed to him free, that is. “In my experience, addicts don’t usually vary how they ingest drugs. There’s more than one reason they’re called drug habits.” I ran a finger over one of the marks. Why, I don’t know; it wasn’t like I could feel it. “And these marks are fresh. All of them.”

“That merely means that Varma died before they could begin to heal.”

“Which means he died fast. And that he injected quite a bit of veinburn into himself at one time. Literally one time, for if he’d given himself five shots with one needle, the first mark would’ve started to heal before the last was made.”

Devona’s eyes widened in comprehension. “Unless it had been some time since Varma had fed, the first mark would’ve fully healed before he made the fifth.”

I glanced at the pool of blood surrounding us. “I think it’s safe to say it hasn’t been that long since his last meal.”

Devona’s lips tightened, but she didn’t respond.

“So if the first mark is as fresh as the last, that means Varma was injected by five different needles at the same time. And I doubt even the bloodchild of a Darklord is talented enough to do that-and then make the needles disappear the instant before he dies. No, Varma was killed. Probably to keep him from revealing what happened to the Dawnstone.” I looked up and down the alley. “No tracks. Whoever injected Varma took off before he started puking.” Too bad; I could have used an easy-to-follow set of bloody footprints just then.

I stood. “Damn it!” I swore in frustration. With Varma dead, and no clues as to who killed him, I didn’t know what to do next.

And then I saw a tiny black shape I hadn’t noticed before scuttle quickly away along the surface of the alley wall. A roach. Or something so close to a roach as to make no difference.

I knew then what we could do-if I was willing to risk it, that is. But given Papa Chatha’s prognosis for my survival, what choice did I have?

Time to pay Gregor a visit.

“C’mon, Devona. We need to talk to someone.”

“Talk-Matthew, Varma’s dead. We have to take care of him.”

“Take care…what are you talking about? He’s dead; for real this time. There’s nothing we can do for him now.”

“We can not leave him lying in an alley like discarded refuse,” she said tightly.

“Well, we can’t very well take him with us. Even in Nekropolis, carrying a bloody corpse around attracts attention. Besides, you didn’t seem to care very much for him when I made the mistake of calling him your brother. In fact, you seemed quite offended.”

“Varma was not especially kind to me, it’s true. But he was related to me, after a fashion. He was family. And besides, you just don’t leave a person to rot in an alley when he dies-it just isn’t right!”

“Now I know you don’t get out of the Cathedral much. Most of the people in this city would do just that and not think twice about it. Hell, I doubt they’d even think once about it.”

“I’m not most people. But I guess you are, eh?”

“What are you insinuating?”

“I can’t believe how cold you’re being, Matt. The way you didn’t blink an eye when we found Varma…examined him as if he were just a piece a meat. He was alive and now he’s dead. Doesn’t that mean anything to you? Doesn’t it do anything to you?”

“I’m a zombie, Devona. And zombies don’t feel emotions, at least not the same way-”

“Normal zombies don’t think, either; they only do what their masters tell them too. But you think just fine. If you don’t feel anything, perhaps it doesn’t have anything to do with your being a zombie. Perhaps that’s who Matthew Richter really is-a man who was dead inside long before he died on the outside.”

She pushed past me and ran out of the alley. I just stood and watched her go, her words having hurt me in a way I didn’t think I could be hurt anymore. I told myself I’d only been doing my job, had been focused on trying to help Devona and prevent my final end.

Maybe she was right, maybe I should have, could have, felt more. But Christ, I was a cop for twenty years, and in that time I saw more cruelty, despair, and death than I can remember. You had to become numb eventually to survive, to get through the day without losing it, climbing up a water tower, and taking potshots at pedestrians. All cops knew it; it was part of the price you paid when you signed on to serve and protect.

But human beings aren’t machines: they can’t turn off their emotions at work and then turn them on once they get home. So they get into the habit of leaving them off all the time. That’s why so many cops are divorced, like me. Or end up substance abusers or suicides.

Maybe Devona was right; maybe I had been a zombie long before I came to Nekropolis.

I looked down at Varma, and tried to feel something-sadness, pity, disgust. But I didn’t feel anything. I hadn’t known Varma. But I did know Devona.

I bent down and, as best I could with my bum right arm, I lifted him over my shoulder and carried him out of the alley.

Devona didn’t say anything when I caught up with her. We walked in silence, making our way through the crowds in the street as best we could. I had been wrong about one thing: no one paid any attention to us. Since it was the Descension celebration, I guess everyone assumed that we were escorting a friend who’d ingested a little too much fun. That, or they had ingested a little too much of their own and didn’t give a damn about anything except remaining upright.

I didn’t know what Devona expected us to do with the body. If we took Varma back to the Cathedral-to Lord Galm-that would be the end of our investigation. Galm would learn of the Dawnstone’s theft, punish Devona (and perhaps blame her for not informing him about the Dawnstone earlier so that he could have taken steps to prevent his son’s death), and in a day or two I’d be a pile of Kellogg’s Zombie Flakes. Unless Lord Galm in his anger decided to destroy Devona and me on the spot.

Preoccupied with these cheery thoughts, I almost didn’t notice when Devona held up a hand for me to stop. She pointed to a hulking gray figure stomping unimpeded down the street as if the crowd didn’t exist.

“Sentinel!” she called out.

The faceless-and for that matter earless-golem stopped, and then turned in our direction. It regarded us for several seconds before heading toward us with its stiff-legged gait, parting the crowd before it like the Moses of ambulatory clay.

It stopped and regarded us with whatever sensory apparatus it possessed. It looked like every other Sentinel I’d ever seen, save that this one had faint line about nine inches long down the middle of its chest. Probably a souvenir left by one of Nekropolis’s more powerful-and foolish-denizens resisting arrest.

“My friend and I found this man,” she indicated Varma, “in the alley behind the Broken Cross. We believe he died of a drug overdose.”

The Sentinel stood impassively for a moment and then pointed with a thick finger at the ground. The message was clear; I set Varma down. The Sentinel bent forward from the waist as if hinged, and examined the body. At least, I assumed it examined the body. I had no real way of telling for certain.

When it was satisfied, the Sentinel straightened and pointed down the street. Again, the message was unmistakable. We were free to go.

If I’d been alive, I’d have probably had to release a relieved breath. There had been a good chance that the Sentinel might’ve wanted to take us to the Nightspire for questioning by an Adjudicator. Maybe there was too much going on during the Descension festival for the Sentinel to bother. Even in Nekropolis, where the police force had been mystically manufactured, there weren’t enough cops to go around.

I nodded, one cop to another, and we got the hell out of there before the Sentinel could change its mind. When we were halfway down the street, I looked back to see that the Sentinel had slung Varma’s body over its shoulder and was moving off in the opposite direction-toward the Nightspire.

“The Adjudictors will eventually identify Varma, and then inform Lord Galm,” Devona said. “And Father will claim the body and see that it’s laid to rest.” She sounded relieved.

“Then you intend to continue searching for the Dawnstone?”

“Of course. Whatever gave you the idea I wanted to stop?”

Human, vampire, or a combination of the two-sometimes women just didn’t make any sense to me.

“Oh, and Matt? Thanks.” She smiled gratefully.

It was one of the best smiles I’d ever been favored with. “Sure. And now we need to find a way to-”

I was interrupted by the loud blat-blat-blat of some idiot leaning on a car horn.

Across the street, parked halfway on the sidewalk, was a cab.

“Hey!” Lazlo shouted. “You two need a ride?”