Dead & Godless (17 page)

The
angel dealt death without a hint of hesitation or remorse.

“And
I thought the demons were scary,” Corwin murmured as he yanked the ebony sword
loose, freeing his hand.

Briskly
halting, a blood-spattered Ransom reached to pull him up.

“Defense
attorney,
remember? Protecting my client is part of the job description.”

“You’re
no Guardian,” hissed one of the few agents still on his feet. “I remember you!”

“It’s
him!” cried another. “The White-Eyed Shadow!”

“It’s
been a while since I’ve heard that name,” said Ransom.

He
grinned dangerously and his eyes flared with molten light. For an instant his
form darkened, save for those eyes and a pearl strip of teeth. The demons
shrank back, swords quivering in their hands.

“Our
business is not with you, Hunter,” stammered one of them. “That man is our
rightful prey!”

“As
you are mine.”

In
the blink of an eye, Ransom closed the distance, cleaving the cowardly demon in
two. He shifted his stance fluidly and plunged his katana through the chest of
another, but this last one refused to die. Abandoning his weapon, he clasped the
raw edge of the blade. Holy flames leapt forth, immolating his hands, yet he held
his grip.

“You
may slay these bodies, you may banish our souls, but you will not leave this
place,” he grimly promised. “Our master . . . He is already here.”

A
violent blaze enveloped his entire body as Ransom kicked him loose and into the
battered tour bus. Gasoline leaked from where the spray of bullets had ruptured
its tank, the fire spreading in seconds. One last passenger jumped from the
upper deck, and then the air shook with a tremendous blast.

Corwin
buried his face in his elbow as a wall of heat singed his skin, but Ransom
didn’t move. He didn’t even blink. The angel’s attention was focused vigilantly
on the terrible presence that he sensed before him.

A
shadowy figure strode through the burning wreckage.

“Isley!”
growled Ransom.

Not waiting
for an invitation, he coiled his legs and bolted towards the threat. His sword
streaked in a diving arc. And stopped. Barehanded, and by the strength of but a
single arm, the demon held the fell blade at bay.

“Is
that any way to greet a fellow attorney?” spoke the bald, wrinkled mask of the
Prosecutor, a visage that had haunted Corwin more than once along his journey.

“I
was just introducing myself to your staff.”

“Yet
several still cling to their mortal vessels.” Isley blinked and his soulless
eyes inverted—the whites of his eyes darkening, framing pale, pupilless
retinas. “You might once have been the White-Eyed Shadow, but your blade has
grown dull.”

“Even
a dull blade can cut.”

Ransom
leaned his weight into the sword and its edge sparked as though the demon’s hand
were forged of steel. A thin trickle of tar-black blood ran down Isley’s
forearm. With a flick of his wrist, he flung the angel back. Ransom managed to
hold his stance as he landed some ten feet away, shoes skidding atop the
fire-strewn road.

Unconcerned,
Isley glanced down at his palm.

“Do
you intend to scratch me to death?” The flames that wreathed his hand expired
and the shallow cut sealed. “I am not so weak as to be hunted by a wolf without
fangs.”

“Then
you’ll forgive me if I don’t hold back,” said Ransom.

Again
his eyes seared. The air rippled with pressure and his body became a solid
shadow, the katana shimmering, eager to slice bone and spirit alike. Isley
blanched, but before Ransom could raise the sword, a hissing brand scorched the
back of his hand. A circular glyph had appeared there. Enclosed within was the
triangular mark of the all-seeing eye. As he clutched the burning scar, the
gleam in his eyes dimmed.

“I
see, so your power was sealed!” Isley cackled with disdain. “It would seem that
you’ve lost your Father’s favor.”

“A temporary
handicap, otherwise this just wouldn’t be fair.”

Despite
his boast, Ransom held no illusions. He faced a demon archlord. Even if he were
at his best, to take Isley lightly would be to invite peril.

Not
good. If he targets Corwin . . .

Breathing
heavily, Corwin wobbled on his feet. Undead or not, his body had lost a lot of
blood. At least the pain from the gunshot wound was beginning to dull. In fact,
everything
was beginning to dull. The chaotic battle unfolding in the
street felt vague and unreal, an echo of a dream that he had only just awoken
from. In a lightheaded daze, he gazed at his hands and they blurred into
double-vision. However, his new hands moved differently from the originals. As
Corwin stared, admiring this curious new pair of transparent limbs, the
strength fled his legs and he collapsed to one knee.

Ransom
shot him an alarmed look.

“Corwin!”

Instantly
the angel was by his side, bracing him against a fall, but Corwin’s unfocused
vision was going dark. And Isley had no intention of waiting.

The Prosecutor
took a step and then disappeared, moving with such speed that he seemed to
teleport. A clawed hand tore the air. But Corwin and Ransom were no longer
there. Sensing his prey, his head swiveled towards the bus. Ransom stood atop
the corner of the smoking ruin with his client slung over his shoulder. Steaks
of crimson scarred the side of his face where Isley’s claw had grazed him.

The angel
and the demon locked eyes.

“His
soul calls out to us,” Isley said, blood dripping from his fingertips. “You
cannot protect him from himself.”

As
Ransom turned, the wind gusted. Smoke and drifting embers swirled around him,
leaving only emptiness in their wake.

Yesterday’s Sins

“My head is
killing me,” grumbled Corwin, opening his eyes.

Branches
sighed as a gentle breeze blew through the forest, revealing patches of sky
high above. Birds chirped and insects buzzed, that is, if the tiny, luminous
creatures that flitted about could be called insects. Corwin lifted his head,
but stopped short of sitting up. The firm green bed swayed beneath him. He
realized that his resting place was a giant leaf, and not a low-hanging one.
Stranger still, strands of light encircled his arms and legs.

One
of the glowing bugs hovered above his left shin, fastening the slender thread
with a knot. Corwin reflexively jerked his knee. Buzzing crossly, the creature
darted at his face, stopping inches in front of his nose. Up close, there was
no mistaking the pixie. She pursed her lips in a pout and waved a scolding
finger.

“Sorry!”
he declared. “By all means, go right ahead and continue tying me up.”

Promptly
returning to her work, she tightened the knot so that the thread hugged his
leg. As the pixie finished, the light strands faded until they became
imperceptible. She zipped off to rejoin her friends and disappeared among the
hundreds of her people that danced amidst the glade.

Corwin’s
leaf hung in the center of a ring of trees, their tall trunks almost perfectly
flush, not that he could really see them. Thick vines covered nearly every inch
of bark. Misty waterfalls poured between the lower yawnings and the air was
choked with humidity. Corwin crept towards the edge of his leaf to get a better
view, and as he leaned out, the leaf leaned with him.

“Oops!”

He
tried to scramble back, but it was too late.

“I’m
not afraid!” Corwin shouted defiantly, his voice rising to the treetops as he
plummeted towards the turquoise pool below.

The fall’s
momentum plunged him a dozen fathoms beneath the surface. A rush of water
roared and a hurricane of bubbles whirled about him. Despite the pool’s
deceptively small diameter, as the bubbles lifted, it revealed itself to be
unimaginably deep. The surrounding walls of roots and stone descended a far way,
narrowing to an undersea tunnel, its dark passage just broad enough to swim
through. Staring into it, Corwin glimpsed a golden light. Not one light, he
realized, but a cluster of lights, a remote galaxy burning in the ocean depths.

The strangling
pressure in his chest reminded him that he wasn’t a fish, and while drowning
seemed a silly cause for worry in the afterlife, he decided not to chance it. The
water grew warmer, the soft prism above brightening as he kicked towards it.
Breaking the surface, he gulped air and took a quick survey of the glade.

“Glad
to see you’ve overcome your fear of heights,” said Ransom.

The
angel lounged against a viny tree trunk, sitting atop a root that ran just a
foot or so under the water. He was naked as far as his client could tell, but
that wasn’t what made Corwin stare. From the neck down, his body was
crisscrossed with scars. A horrific history of slashes, scrapes and gouges
tattooed his skin—enough wounds to kill an ordinary man ten times over. Ransom
bore the scars with blasé indifference. Reclining, he puffed leisurely on a
cigarette, the smoke mingling with the steam that rose off the spring’s burbling
ripples.

“You
look like a tiger’s scratching post,” Corwin said as he pulled himself onto the
submerged bench. “What happened back there?”

“You
began to desynchronize. Basically, your soul decided that your body was no
longer fit for duty. I had to call in a favor to get you sewn back into one
piece.”

“I
didn’t know there was a limit to how much damage this body could take.”

“It’s
not about the amount of damage, but the type,” explained Ransom. “You were
stabbed by a soulrender. Forged in the heat of the First Flame, the blades
wielded by angels and demons don’t just cut flesh. They sever the bond between
body and spirit.”

“So
that’s what those strands of light are for? To keep my soul from coming loose?”

“Luckily
for you, the tear was a minor one, but such wounds tend to leave a mark.”

Corwin
glanced at his right hand, discovering a scar of his own.

“Under
the circumstances, maybe leaving my body behind would have been for the best.”

“No,
humans aren’t meant to be bodiless. Your soul would have jumped into the next
available container, likely one of Isley’s choosing, and then I’d have a hell
of a time tracking you down, which reminds me . . .” He opened a hand and there
in his palm was the cross. “Try not to drop it next time.”

“I’m
hoping that there won’t be a next time, although you seemed to be enjoying
yourself. What did they mean when they called you the White-Eyed Shadow?”

“That’s
ancient history,” Ransom said tersely. “Nothing that concerns your case.”

“Don’t
give me that!” Corwin brazenly grabbed the cigarette out of Ransom’s mouth and
proceeded to take a drag. “My whole life is an open book to you! The least you
could do is shed a little light on your past career.”

“You
really want to know?”

“I
think I deserve to.”

The
angel gazed contemplatively into the flickering mirror of the pool.

“Alright,”
he decided, snatching back his cig and shooting upright with a splash. “Follow
me.”

Behind
one of the waterfalls, the roots forked to form the entranceway to a
partially-sunken cave. Ransom stooped and delved within.

“You’re
going to catch a cold, walking around like that,” muttered Corwin as he waded
after his stark-naked attorney.

The
cave’s elevation gradually climbed, the floor rising above water-level and the
shadowy ceiling stretching to an unknown height. A cool draft swept away the
mugginess. Corwin’s clothes were completely dry by the time he spotted the dim,
violet-blue glow of the exit.

“Long
before I was a defense attorney, I was a Hunter,” spoke Ransom, who again
donned his suit. “My duty was simple: to seek out and vanquish demons that
prowled the mortal plane.”

They
strode beneath the arch of two trees that leaned until their trunks met. The
woodland on the other side was mysterious but not unearthly. Ivy clung to the
beech trees, covering their bark with waxy, dark-green leaves. Owls hooted and
a lonesome wolf bayed from some deep corner of the forest.

“With
the skills I’d honed during the Betrayer’s War, the job came naturally to me, and
over the years I earned a bit of a reputation. Those I hunted came to call me
the White-Eyed Shadow. My strength was formidable in those days, but even when
fighting demons, there are rules to our battles, rules that must never be
broken.”

Night
had only just fallen and a string of windows was aglow beyond the tree line.
Smoke rose off the chimneys of the village’s stone huts.

“It
was the thirteenth century and I was in England on the trail of a demon named
Strega. He and his followers had taken up residence in a band of outlaws.”

As
they neared one of the humble dwellings, Corwin heard the thunder of galloping
hooves. At the sound, a woman who had been toting a bucket of water let it drop
to the ground. Grabbing a pitchfork, she dashed home and hastily shooed her
young son inside. Doors slammed and windows were shuttered from one house to
the next.

“With
most of the men off to war, villages like this one were easy prey for bandits.
They roamed the countryside, raping and pillaging and generally creating their
own little slice of Hell on Earth.”

The
marauders that charged over the hill were no less than thirty men strong. Suited
in hides and leather armor, they hollered war cries, their blades rattling the
shutters as they galloped by.

With
the villagers sufficiently terrified, the band’s grizzled leader dismounted his
steed. He hefted a battleaxe and hacked at the door of the nearest home. One
stroke and a forceful kick splintered the weathered boards.

As he
stepped inside, the woman thrust valiantly with her pitchfork, but the brigand
was a seasoned warrior. The haft of his axe caught the fork between its prongs,
and with a quick twist, he wrenched the weapon from her grip. A burly hand
reached out, ripping her blouse. He threw her down violently and loosened his
belt as more men stomped into the home.

“Mama!”
a boy cried, and suddenly one of the bandits howled in pain.

Frightened
though he was, the woman’s son had found a dirk and driven it into the outlaw’s
leg. His companions roared with laughter.

“That
brat’s not too bad!” proclaimed their leader.

Yanking
the bloody knife from his thigh, the bandit cast it aside with a murderous
glare.

“You’ve
got guts, boy. Maybe I should show them to you!”

“Please,
not my son!” the woman pleaded.

Leering,
he raised his axe. The mother shrieked and Corwin turned his gaze away.

When
at last the bandits departed, they did so in a blaze, lobbing torches onto the
thatched roofs. The horrid nightmare would not be complete until naught but
ashes was left of the once-peaceful village and all who had called it home.

“I
caught up with them just after a raid,” resumed Ransom, “and having seen their
handiwork, I wasn’t feeling particularly merciful.”

Though
the bandits couldn't see him, their horses felt Ransom’s presence keenly. They
were half a mile down the trail when their leader's destrier reared back on its
hind legs, nearly throwing him from his saddle. Its nostrils flared and it tossed
its mane with a loud whinny.

Hooves
stamped the trodden dirt. Numbered among the steeds were war horses that had
braved the chaos of battle, but the fear that gripped them now was something
deeper, an instinct no trainer could breed out. There wasn't any beast on Earth
that would willingly cross the path of a wrathful angel.

Ransom
stood in the middle of the trail with his soulrender piercing the soil, both
hands resting atop its pommel. Like a curling black mist, the demons left their
hosts and materialized before him. They were twisted copies of the men they had
indwelt, onyx swords, axes and cudgels held at the ready. Their grim circle
slowly constricted.

With
an icy stare that never left Strega, Ransom waited. Fear ruled the hearts of
demons, and as he expected, those at his back swung first. Corwin saw him
change his grip on the katana, but he couldn’t well follow what happened next. The
circle broke and screams were cut short by gurgling coughs. Ransom was
everywhere at once. Obsidian blades snapped and axe hafts shattered against the
edge of his sword. Within seconds, the demonic legion lay slaughtered, all
except for their leader.

“Strega
had gorged himself on evil.”

Stepping
over the corpses of his fallen brethren, the strapping arch demon crossed his
arms and drew twin battleaxes. He bore a jagged scar through his glass right eye
and his beard fell in thick braids.

“He’d
forgotten which one of us was the hunter and which one the prey.”

Ransom
whipped the tainted blood from his blade.

“I
reminded him.”

As
Strega unleashed a mighty war cry, flocks of birds fled from their roosts. Both
axes sliced towards Ransom’s neck. Sidestepping adroitly, he slipped the blades
by a hair’s breadth. His mind was clear, focused. The flames of vengeance
burned hot, but he knew better than to let himself get careless. Even when
Strega missed, the force of his swings sent shudders through the earth and
split trees like chopsticks.

Stunned
and bewildered, the bandits began to share the fear of their mounts, but no
matter how much they urged them on, the horses refused to obey.

Finally
one of Strega’s blows connected. He buried an axehead beneath Ransom’s chest,
hurling him into a tree so hard that its bark was blasted off. The angel slumped
forward, eyes closed and arms hanging limp at his sides.

Strega
spoke in a deep voice that resonated from the dark hollows of time.

“Do
you think you’ve changed anything?” he asked. “Where the feast is, there will
the revelers be. We merely gather at the table that man has set.”

Ransom
exhaled—a long, low hiss—and opened his molten eyes.

“This
feast is over.”

Wrapped
in blackest gloom, he took on the form for which he was named, and what had
been an even fight became an execution. Strega glimpsed his leg sailing free
before he even realized that he’d been cut. He toppled to one side and bellowed
in rage as Ransom crossed his scar with another.

Strega’s
body sank to the ground, his foul spirit expelled, and Ransom looked once more to
the bandits.

“For
a moment, their eyes were opened. They felt doubt, perhaps even a flicker of remorse.
But that moment passed. Their leader steeled his gaze and I knew that Strega
had been right, that it would all happen again.”

The
savage man snapped the reins and his destrier, believing the worst had passed,
trotted hesitantly forward.