Dead Lucky (7 page)

"How are you feeling?" she asked.
 

I took a deep breath and coughed. She handed me a towel that was already stained with my blood. I spit some fresh drops out onto it. "I've been better." I looked through the glass roof at the thousands of stars above us. "You were right. It is pretty amazing."

She put her arms around me and gave me a gentle hug. "I thought you were going to die, you were shivering so badly. This was the only thing I could think of."

"It worked."

"I'm glad."

I looked up at her. "What time is it?"

"Four."

"Let's finish this job and go home."

"Are you sure?"

I pushed myself away. "We can't stay here. It won't take long for Despre to be missed."

"We should go back to the hotel. You need to rest."

"I need my meds, which are in Chicago. I need the money to pay for them, which is down on the fucking bayou. We have the dice, let's bring them to Marie, collect the money, and go."

Dannie slid off the bed and walked over to Despre's dresser. Two stacks of clothes were waiting on top of it.
 

"The guard had your build, and Elizabeth was close enough to mine. Lucky for you that I shot him in the head." She threw me my coat and underwear, along with the slacks and white collared shirt the user had been wearing, while she dressed in the dead girl's jeans and t-shirt. When she was done, she went back to the bed and lifted the pillows. A pair of handguns rested underneath, along with two of the smaller blades that had been stashed in the hidden room.
 

"I found one of the guns in the dresser, another in his desk drawer. I figured we might need them."

I finished dressing, doing my best to ignore the pain shooting through my body. The burn seemed to be the worst, though it was hard to differentiate between the wounds and my normal course of dying. I shoved the gun and knife into the back of my pants, hiding them with the coat.
 

We left a few minutes later.

"Think the ogre ratted us out?" I asked during the ride down in the elevator. I could imagine the doors opening to a full line of S.W.A.T, rifles aimed at our faces.

"I saw how he reacted to the dice. Considering no one came up for us, I think he decided discretion was the better part of valor." She paused and stared at me for a few seconds. "So?"

"So, what?"

"You wanted to touch the damn things. What was it like?"

I hadn't even had time to think much about it. "I'm not sure. There's... something... about them. When I picked them up they were unnaturally warm. I don't know what they do, but I can feel that they have power."

"Necromancers are so rare. I never thought there would be an artifact keyed to that frequency."

I stuck my hand in my pocket, feeling the dice there. They were still warm. "That's the thing. Whatever power they have, it's self-contained. They aren't disrupting the fields at all."

She crinkled her eyebrows. "Really? I've never heard of anything like that."

All I could do was shrug. "Anyway, I never thought I would meet another necro. It's too bad he was such a dick."

"Yeah. He had a nice one."

"Do you have to?"

She laughed.

We hit the ground floor. The receptionist was still behind the desk, and she did her best to look at us without looking at us while we crossed the lobby. The doorman got the door for us, and the valet opened to door to the cab, already waiting at the curb.
 

"Have a great evening," he said right before he closed the door. I don't know what the ogre said to them, if anything, but it was clear they wanted us to go away and never come back.

"Where you headed tonight?"

It was a new driver, a goblin. He was sitting in a booster seat so he could get his eyes over the wheel.

"I need to get out to the Laveau estate. Do you know where that is?"

"Yeah. We aren't allowed to go outside the walls. I can drop you off at 10-gate. You'll have to walk the rest of the way."

"Do you know how far it is from there?"

"Not sure. Two, three miles, maybe?"

Three miles outside the gate in the dark. I looked over at Dannie, and I could tell she was thinking the same thing:

I hope we have enough bullets.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

When nature calls.

There was a single guard at 10-gate, so named because it was the tenth and final gate along the western wall. It was big enough to drive a truck through, one direction at a time, constructed of a latticework of steel that fed out into the darkness beyond.
 

He had been sitting in a chair in a small gatehouse when the cab pulled up. He stood as we got out.

"Where you headed?" he asked. He was older, with grey hair and a bit of stubble around his face. A high-powered rifle hung from his back, the muzzle sticking up over his shoulders and head.

"Laveau," I said.

"This time of night?"

"I know. It's important."

"You armed?"

I took the gun from my pants and showed it to him.

"Have you ever been outside the wall before?"

"I drove down from Chicago. We were on the road all night."

He laughed. "Son, this is Louisiana. We had giant gators before the change. Now we got gianter, smarter gators. We also got snakes. Huge, white snakes. And the damn Naga. You ever heard of those?"

A nod. "I've heard of those."
 

They were the first new species to come out of the woodwork and attack New Orleans en masse. We killed a hell of a lot more of them than they did of us, but they reproduced more like snakes than people. That meant dozens born at a time, growing to full adulthood in a few months. They were smart enough to make crude weapons, and after fifty years of the wall, smart enough to stay away from it.

"Then you know that you should wait until morning. At least you'll be able to see the fuckers coming."

I felt my stomach tying into knots. "I can't wait."

He shrugged. "Hey, I tried. Hang on a sec while I open the gate. Just enough for you to go through. Scanners ain't picking anything up near the wall, so you should be safe for the first half mile or so. If you want the Laveau place, go down the road that half mile and then turn left, there's a small dirt road that leads out there. Used to be a sign, don't know if it's still there."

He went back to the gatehouse and hit a button or something. The gate was silent as it slid open a crack.
 

"Thanks," I called back to him as Dannie and I passed through.

"Good luck," he replied.

The road was narrow, just wide enough for one lane in each direction, and the lights from the wall only reached about a quarter of a mile. Within ten minutes we found ourselves walking in the light of the stars, able to keep our bearings because of the asphalt at our feet, and otherwise at the mercy of the scanners that claimed there was nothing hostile nearby.
 

We hit the half mile point. The sign was still there, a tiny thing hanging from the corner of a baldcypress, 'Laveau' in scraggly, handwritten script, glowing in iridescent paint. We could just barely make out the rough dirt track headed off to the south, and we would have been screwed if not for additional marks of glowing paint splashed against more distant trees.

"How are you holding up?" Dannie asked. She was more concerned about me than the fact that we were some pretty attractive bait. Well, one of us was, anyway.
 

I laughed as I imagined a gator chomping down on us, swallowing Danelle with a sharp smile, and spitting me out in disgust. "Not dead yet."

"You'll make it."

"If Despre didn't kill me, a little hike won't."

She patted my shoulder, and pulled her pistol from the back of her pants. I did the same. Anything large would only run faster getting hit with the small caliber fire. Naga on the other hand... they had soft bones, and died easier than people.

We started walking. It only took another quarter mile before we could see the light of the estate up ahead, drifting out into the darkness and mingling with the stars. The brush made it impossible to see a house, or a clearing of any kind, but it was a beacon we could aim for, that marked us as safe.

Until they came out of the surrounding cypress, half a dozen, with shitty, crooked, and deadly spears in hand.
 

Their eyes burned gold in the dim light, their moist, scaled pink and white flesh undulating in pace with their heartbeats. Five feet tall at best, limbs and fingers only somewhat defined. They didn't come to talk, and neither did we.

Six bullets, six dead Naga.
 

"The noise is going to attract more." Dannie said what we both knew.

"Run?"

"Run."

We did, picking up the pace, racing wildly along the path. Tree roots and mud made hazards along the way, and we were dependent on pure luck to guide our steps, getting us through the mess without tripping or breaking any limbs.

We made it another half a mile, the lights getting brighter and closer. There wasn't much further to go.

Something splashed in the swamp up ahead and to the right of us, and the trees started rocking and rolling.
 

Ten more steps made it clear.

"Whatever it is, we can't outrun it," I said, coming to a stop and grabbing Dannie's arm. That was when she hit some mud, and we both ate dirt.

"Shit. Get up," she said. Whatever was coming, it was fast.

I scrambled to my feet, feeling my pocket to make sure the dice hadn't been lost, before holding out my hand and helping Danelle up. We stood side by side, guns trained on the darkness, waiting to see what would appear there.

It burst onto the path, a massive triangular head, red eyes, white scales, mouth open wide, revealing a deep gullet and huge fangs. It was easily big enough to take us in with one bite. It was ten feet away, and closing fast.

We opened fire. The muzzle flashes lit up the path, and we waited for the snake to react. With pain, with anger, something.

It slowed to a stop. None of the bullets hit it, instead embedding in the trees nearby.

"Marie?" I said, loud enough to be heard, soft enough to not echo.

She appeared on the path, stepping around the snake without fear of it.
 

"Necromancer. I heard the shots, and thought it was you. I was almost too late." Her white teeth appeared in the darkness. "I trust you have the dice?"

I put my hand on them, feeling their warmth against my flesh.
 

"Yeah. Take me to your mother so we can be done with this."

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

The Queen and the Fool.

She brought us the rest of the way to the plantation: a large, white building nestled in a small clearing in the swamp. It was old and had seen better days, the paint peeled and the wooden frame showing signs of rot. Even so, it was majestic, and now that I was there it's location made sense.
 

It was sitting right on top of a massively dense pocket of magical energy.

"How do you stand the noise?" I asked. My head was hurting from the intensity of the thrumming coming from the fields.

"You get used to it," Marie said. "I grew up here, so the sounds are second nature to me."

"Are you a multi?" Dannie asked. "The bullets... and the snake?"

She laughed. "No. The snake was Mother's doing. She can control the snakes, and the snake people. It's part of her gift as Queen of Voodoo."

"Queen of Voodoo?"

She looked at Dannie. "You don't believe, I know. I can see it in your heart. There is no shame. Not all things were intended to believe all things."

She brought us past an iron gate that was sitting half-open, and up a gravel driveway to the house. There was nobody else outside, though there was plenty of light ringing the walls. I would have guessed the illumination would attract attention, but maybe it was supposed to. When you could control the biggest threats on the bayou...

We entered the house. It was your standard plantation, with a huge open foyer and a bifurcated staircase that wound down opposite walls. It was lined with huge portraits in massive gold frames, lots of antique furniture, and the various random vases and lamps that you would expect. Marie led us to the pair of double doors beneath the stairs.
 

"Be nice to Mother, and she will be nice to you," Marie said.

She grabbed the carved handle of one of the doors and pulled it open. I was expecting a lot of creaking and groaning, but it opened smoothly.

It should have been a ballroom. Instead, it looked more like the inside of a church. Sixteen rows of carved wooden pews lined the room from the back, splitting the center aisle, where a thick white carpet led to the front. The columns on either side were masterfully carved as giant white snakes circling the supports, and the ceiling was painted in a menagerie of symbols and icons that I could only assume were related to voodoo.

At the front of the whole thing, resting on a recliner between two wicks of burning incense, was Marie's mother. She was just as dark as Marie, and just as bald, the same tattoo ringing her head. She was visibly older, her flesh wrinkled and sagging, her belly protruding from her midsection, unlike her daughter with the solid abs. She was wearing a simple white frock, and she had a glass of iced tea in her hand. A third person, a man, stood behind the chair in a well-tailored three piece suit.

"Mother," Marie said. "I brought-"

Her mother raised her hand, and she silenced immediately.

"Do you have them?" the older woman asked.
 

"The dice?" I patted my pocket. "Yes."

She smiled. "I knew I could count on you, boy. The bones never be wrong."

I wasn't sure what she meant.
 

"You have the money?" It was all I cared about at this point. I was going to die without it.

I saw the guy move behind her, lifting a small form in his hand. I felt the fields shifting as he angled the limbs straight out. I looked over at Danelle, and saw that she had been frozen again.