8 Gone is the Witch (41 page)

He
jerked his hand away. Confusion warped his brow. “What… what have you done?” he cried. “I can’t bleed. I’m already dead!”

The
guards, obviously frightened by the events, backed away and cowered into a corner.

“You’re not dead
anymore,” I said, my gaze leveled to a hardened glare. “You’re undead.”

“I don’t
… understand.”

Already
, his eyes were bloodshot, his skin cold and pale.

“I
injected you with zombie blood. Soon, you’ll become one yourself.”

“But why?”

“Isn’t it obvious? I can’t kill you as spectersoma. You’ll only come back more powerful than before.”

I pulled a chunk of rock salt
from my pocket and began scratching at it, allowing the smaller crystals to collect in the palm of my hand.

“You see, Doctor,
unlike spectersoma, zombies aren’t dead, but they aren’t exactly alive either. They’re somewhere in-between. The only thing that can kill a zombie for sure is salt: pure, simple, everyday sea salt, which I happen to have here in my hand. As a precaution, I made sure it’s homegrown. This is salt from right here in the ES.”

I
opened my mouth and dragged the piece of rock salt across my tongue. “Mmm, yum.”

Tony was just picking himself up off the floor.
He came to me on unsteady legs and palmed my shoulder to maintain balance.

“You all right?” I asked.

“Fine. What’s all this about zombies?”

“
Yeah, I brought along some zombie blood. Just needed a trace of the stuff. Thought it might come in handy.” I held up the Incubus ring. “Had it in the horns. Clever, eh?”

“
Lilith, where in the world did you get zombie blood? Or should I ask?”

“Newcastle.”

“That’s not what I meant, and you know it.”

“
Fine. I got it from the Paynes. Remember them? The husband went to see that crazy voodoo mambo to bring his wife back from the dead.”

“Payne. Right,
Alex and Angela. I remember that case. Whatever became of them?”

I shook my head. “That’s another story. Can’t go into it
now.”

Even as we spoke, I could see the profound change
s taking place in Doctor Lowell. He could hear us, but no longer could he understand what we were saying. His brain was turning to mush. His muscles, however, were getting stronger. Soon, he would possess incredible strength. Zombies are like chimps and orangutans in that respect, pound for pound stronger than humans.

“Okay, it’s time
,” I said, having scraped the rock salt down to a handful of crystals. I walked up to the doctor and unceremoniously dumped the salt over his head.

The effects were immediate. The salt began burning into his skin and eating through his flesh. He let out an ungodly cry
as he thrashed and kicked about the floor. It reminded me of a poisoned cockroach on its back, its legs twitching as toxins destroy its central nervous system.

Leona’s face soured, contorting through the emotional gamut from shock to dismay and finally disgust. She turned away, sickened and repulse
d. Guess it’s true what they say. Zombie killing is not for the faint of heart.

We stuck around long
enough to make sure there was nothing left of the body to reconstitute a viable spectersoma. Judging from the puddle of bubbling green slime left behind by the run-a-way meltdown process, I’d say we were okay in that department.

Besides the hole in the wall, there was only one other way out of
the chamber. To buy a little time before leaving, I walked up to the two guards sheltering in the corner.

“See this?” I
shook my two fists. “I have two handfuls of witch dust with your names on it if you try following us. You understand?”

They
both nodded.

“Good.”

We headed out, following a passageway back to ground level. From there, we slipped into a room opposite the turret steps. Tony looked out the window and gave the thumbs up.

“We’re good
. The front gate is just outside. All we have to do is reach it, open the gates and run like hell.”

I looked at him as th
ough he had just explained cold fusion in a bottle. “That’s it, eh?”

“Yeah.”

“And you don’t think the guards will have anything to say about it?”

“Yes, but I thought
we would pulverize them with a zip ball or something.”

“Or something?
Tony. There’s too much dolomite in this castle. It’s zapped all my power. Yours too. We got nothin`.”

“So
then we do it without zip balls.”

“Without the zips?”

“Sure.”

“All right, what do you suggest? We can’t do the cloaking spell because we can’t cloak Leona.”

“Maybe we don’t need to.”

“She can
’t cloak herself.”

“
She doesn’t have to. Sometimes the least obvious things are those that are right under our noses.”

“
Yes, and whatever it is, I think it stinks.”

“You haven’t even heard my plan yet.”

“You’re right. Sorry. Let’s hear it.”

“What if we go out there acting like Leona is our prisoner? We walk right by everyone, act
as if we own the place. It could work, couldn’t it?”

I
thought about it for half a nanosecond. “You’re damn right it could. NOT!”

“Then let’s hear your plan.”

“I don’t have one.”

“Of course you don’t. So we’ll do it my way.”

“All right, fine. Get us killed.”

“
I’m not going to get us killed. Not if we have these. Wait here a sec.”

He cross
ed the room and liberated two decorative broadswords off the wall. He then handed one to me, kept one for himself and gave the bayonet to Jerome.

“What the
...” I struggled to hold the sword up with both hands. “You expect me to carry this? It weighs a ton.”

“You don’t have to use it. It’s just to make us look official.”

“Official? Tony, you’re wearing a bathrobe and slippers. How official do you think that looks?”

“
Okay, first of all, they’re moccasins. Secondly, this isn’t a bathrobe; it’s the traditional garment of local professional merchants and businessmen.”

“You look like
a monk.”

“
What’s wrong with that? I’ll have you know that the monk’s robe was the inspiration for the original Jedi robe.”

“Jedi? H
a! Beam me up, Scotty.”

“That was Star Trek.”

“Oh. Did they wear robes in Star Trek?”

“No.”

“I rest my case.”

“What case?”

“My case for leaving the damn swords.”

“We might need them.”

“Yes and they might get us killed.”

“How
are they going to get us killed?”

“
Look. What’s the first thing a cop does when a suspect won’t drop his weapon?”

“We shoot him.”

“Again, I rest my case.”

“Fine.
No swords.” He took one last look out the window. “Okay, two of the guards just walked off. Now’s a good time to go.”

He hopped out the window, helped Leona down from the sill, then
Jerome and lastly me. When we turned around to head out, we discovered a most bizarre thing. No longer were we out front of the castle by the main gate; instead, we were out back looking at the stables.

“What the
f...” Tony gave me the same look Carlos gives him when stuck with the bill down at the Percolator.

“
Wait. I know this,” I said. “Don’t tell me. Starts with an F. Four letters. Fuck? I felt a tug on my hand and looked down.

“Jerome no fuck
now! Fuck later.”

I yanked my hand away and swatted him on the head
. “No! You little perv!”

Leona
covered her mouth to stifle a laugh. I smiled back at her, pulled on my shirttail and straightened my shoulders. “You’ll have to excuse lizard breath here,” I said. “We’re still working on his manners.”

Tony
said, “Screw manners. What the hell just happened?”

I took a guess. “Contravista.”

“What?”

“
Sure. The window at the back of the structure overlooks a view out front. We saw it at the bar on our first day here. Remember?”

He took
a deep breath and let it out. “Man, this place is––”

“Fucked. I know.”

“I was going to say bizarre.”

“
Oh no you weren’t. You were just dying to say fuck.”

“Fuck!” Jerome
cried. “Fuck, fuck, fuck!”

“
See what you started. Come on. Let’s move.”

We
scurried across the back of the castle along the right side, keeping close to the wall and down low. After turning the corner out front, Tony and I assumed a rigid posture. We took Leona by the arms as if she were our prisoner and marched her straight up to the gate. Two very large guards operating the checkpoint there dutifully stopped us.

“Who goes?”

“Wow,” I said, “a two word sentence. You must be the smart one.”

“Who goes?”
he repeated.

“Oh, I get it. That’s all you know. Hey, it’s a tough language. Give it time.”

The two leveled their spears. Tony stepped forward. “Lord Lowell asked us to take the prisoner to the forest to prepare her for the Decussate Day ceremony.”

I put my hand to the side of my mouth
. “Told us.”

He did the same. “What?”

“Lord Lowell told us. He wouldn’t ask us.”

“Oh. Right.” He
squared his shoulders to the guards. “Lord Lowell
told
us to take the prisoner to the forest and––”

“We heard you
.” The guard made a stabbing gesture with his spear. “Who goes?”

“
Oops, see.” I dismissed him with a wave. “You almost had me there, Tonto. Thought you had a real vocabulary.”

Tony said, “
He’s pointing at Jerome.”

“
Oh. He’s our sacrificial driget. Can’t prepare a Decussate Day bride without sacrificing a driget or two. That’s what I always say.”

I saw the first guard give the second one a look,
obviously questioning the validity of our story. The second one shook his head.

I let in
to him. “What do you mean no, Jackass? Do you want me to go back in there and tell Lord Lowell that you won’t let his bride get ready? Do you? Because I will, Buster. Just try me.”

“Easy
,” Tony whispered. “Don’t overdo it.”

“No, Tony. I
mean it. This shit for brains is too dumb to know his ass from his elbow. If he––”

“Enough!” The guards
raised their spears chest high and started towards us.

“Great
.” Tony led us backwards in equal measure. “Now you did it. You pissed them off.”

“
Sorry. I was playing good cop bad cop.”

“Yeah, well next time leave
the good cop bad cop routine to Carlos and me.”

“
Speaking of Carlos,” I gave a subtle nod towards the gate. “Isn’t that him?”

T
he gates opened. The guards shouldered their weapons, turned and saluted.

With the
ir attention diverted, Tony leaned over and whispered, “Why would you think that’s Carlos?”

“The academy ring.”

He looked again just as Carlos entered. “You’re right, it’s him. What the hell is he doing?”

I have to say, i
n my wildest dreams, I never thought Carlos had the balls to try to pull off such a crazy stunt. It was so incredibly preposterous, brazen and imaginative, so cockamamie and foolish, it just had to work.

I turned to Tony, the smile on my face
was busting my cheeks. “He should definitely earn the Big Kahonnas badge for this one.”

“If he doesn’t
, he can have mine.”

Apparently,
Carlos had found the dead soldier that Tony and I tossed over the wall earlier. Recognizing it was a high-ranking officer, he hatched a bold and daring plan.

He
told us later how he had stripped off the officer’s uniform before severing the poor bastard’s head. He then propped the head up on the end of a stick, slid the stick down the front into his pants and pulled the uniform up over his face.