The Living Night (Book 2) (24 page)

"That was my plan."

"In any case, I'm sorry. Forgive me?"

He watched her closely, his antenna up and out
and on the search for guile, but he found none; she was sincere.

"You're forgiven,” he said. “Any woman
who'll buy my drinks can get away with pretty much anything."

"I'm serious, Harry."

Slowly, she reached out a hand across the bar
and held it open, palm up. Warily, he took the hand. She gripped him tight, but
not too tight. The contact was … intimate.

"Harry," she whispered, "have you
ever given any thought to, you know, Turning?"

Up until then he'd been feeling slightly buzzed.
Sobriety stormed his body on the instant.

"I ..." he began,
then
cleared his throat. "I've never wanted to live forever. Maybe I would've
said something different when I had something to live for ... when my wife and
kids were still alive, but now—"

"That's just it! Harry, don't you see? You
never started
over,
you just gave up, on everything.
You even stopped killing for the most part. But Harry,
there's so much to
see
." She released his hand and stood. "Just think about it. Meanwhile,
let's go find that bastard Kiernevar."

Shaken, he followed her out of the bar and they
began their search.

"By the way," he said, "where are
we going?"

"He might be a fruit, but Kiernevar will go
where everybody else is going. Everybody likes a show."

They entered the theater where the Funhouse of
the Forsaken was practicing its routines. At the moment, it looked like a dress
rehearsal was going on, the magnificent red curtains pulled back, lights
shining from up above. Maximillian, just below the stage, shook his head and
shouted at one of the actors, but Harry suspected even that was part of the
performance. The seats were far from full, because many would-be spectators
were still at the Pit, but once the fights were through for the night, this
place would fill up fast.

At first Harry didn't see Kiernevar. He and
Cloire wandered the aisles for some minutes before he looked up at the balcony
seating on the second level, which was deserted except for three figures.
Sitting near the front row was Kiernevar, as Cloire had predicted, flanked by
two Castle Guards, which was S.O.P. for the contenders to the throne. Kiernevar
hunched forward, engrossed in the action on stage.

"He looks like a fucking guppy,"
scoffed Cloire.

She and Harry found the stairs and ascended to
the balcony, where a sloping aisle led them to the bottom.

One of the Guards rose aggressively. Kiernevar
turned. Instead of telling the Guard to retake his seat, he cocked his head at
the second one, who got to his feet as well. Not a very friendly sign, Harry
thought.

"Kiernevar," the lunatic said.

"Knock that shit off," Cloire told him.

Kiernevar, who was
bare-chested and wearing only a loincloth, climbed to his feet and faced them,
giving Harry a view of the werewolf's skeletal frame, smeared with feces from
groin to gullet.
He stank like a sewer; it was a wonder the guards put up with him. Certainly
nobody sat close to him.

"Fuck, but you need a bath," Cloire
said.

"Go away,” he said. “No longer part of
death-squad is Kiernevar.
King
.
Lord Kiernevar."

"But why?"
Harry asked, grateful
at least that the creature was able to communicate, however awkwardly.

"Kiernevar is strong,” Kiernevar said. “Others
are weak. Kiernevar is born to rule. Now go. Or he will kill you."

Cloire made a fist, which she seemed to just
barely keep at her side. Harry touched her forearm. Slowly, she relaxed.

"K, don't you miss your friends?” she said,
trying a different
tac
. “Come
on back to us. We can be pals again, just like before. So long as you take
your
fucking pill. Come
on,
follow
me back to our rooms like a good boy."

"Kiernevar hate pill. Pill deadens his
mind, makes him calm when he does not like calm." He spat.
"Chaos," he said.
"Voices and movement.
This is what pill takes away. Now he is back and will be king. Soon all shall
worship Kiernevar."

Harry swallowed. Kiernevar, from what he’d
heard, used to be a vagrant in New
York. Why all the sudden did he
want
to be a ruler? Was it because he'd only now been exposed to the idea by staying
at Sarnova's castle? Or—and this is what Harry thought more likely—was it
because someone had planted the thought in his head?

Cloire, still intent on winning Kiernevar to her
side again, asked him, "What about his friends—
your
friends?"

"He has none."

"Get your goddamned pronouns right, you
fucking little ..." Growling, she shut herself up and started over.
"Remember your friends in the death-squad, K, the good times we used to
have. You want that back, don't you?"

"No friends, only Byron, and he does what
you tell him.
Also Danielle a friend to Lord Kiernevar.
Buy him hot dog."

Seeming to realize she'd lost the battle, Cloire
sneered. "You make poor friends, Kiernevar. Byron's a fool and your little
girlfriend isn't as nice as you might think. She's gone off to kill her foster
brother—remember all that?"

An odd look came into his face, as if this filled
him with concern.

"She goes to dungeon?" he asked.

"That's right."

Harry and Cloire exchanged glances. For some
reason, Kiernevar didn't like the thought of Danielle going to kill Ascott,
although he seemed to show little regard for life itself.

A sense of urgency overcame Kiernevar. He leapt
over several rows to land in the aisle. Then, walking swiftly but with a
strange dignity, he marched past Cloire and Harry and made for the stairs. His
guards followed, and the trio descended from the balcony and disappeared from
sight.

"Fucking weird," said Cloire.

*
    
*
    
*

Danielle
woke with a strangled gasp. She’d been hanged by the neck from a noose, she
realized, and she dangled from one of the larger limbs on the Tree, her hands
tied tightly behind her back. Butt-naked, she swung back and forth in the air,
her feet—also bound—several yards above the ground. Swinging …

What was making her swing?

Swish-crack.

It hit her again, a large bone-branch slapping
her,
whipping
her, from behind. She tried to scream, but the rope had
dug so deeply into her neck she couldn't manage even a squeak. She couldn't
even breathe.

Swish-crack!
The branch whipped her
again.

Jesus!

Was this the Balaklava's
way of telling her that she was their slave, that she would be whipped and
hanged as they saw fit?

Shadow draped the room, darker than before she'd
blacked out. Torches still blazed along the round earthen walls, but the light
that had shone behind the green glass had faded, leaving only the flickering
light of flame.
This is hell
, she thought.
That's what they want me
to feel. Fuck them. I really will be in hell before they get to me.

Skulls snapped all about her, their jaws
chattering, the mean little tree-fruits trying to mock her.
Well, you just
go right
ahead,
snap your little teeth until they fall
out. Before you lift one fucking hair on the back of my neck, you'll all be
wearing dentures.

Though she was naked, she didn't think she'd
been sexually violated yet. That was bad. It meant they'd been saving it for
when she woke up so that they could make a production of it.
A
painful production, most likely.
Closing her eyes, she tried not to
think about it.

Swish-crack
.

The branch whipped her from behind again,
cutting into her back and buttocks, and she realized she'd lost a lot of blood,
too much to try any mind-tricks. She wished she could stop the damned branch
from whipping her, at least, but there wasn't any way she could counter the power
of Junger and Jagoda.

She opened her eyes and tried to get a fix on
her surroundings. The zombies milled in a circle around her, talking as best
they could among themselves.

"Look, she's awake," she heard one
say.

"Good, good.
Time for the
second course."

"I
c'n
still
taste'r
on me
tongue."

"She doesn't eat enough salt."

Shit!
How had she gotten herself into this situation?
Because of Ludwig, that's why, because she had to find out who killed him, had
to deliver justice.
Had to be a Marshal.
Was it worth
this?

As the swinging rope took her to new and
less-appetizing angles, she could see that Junger and Jagoda were sprawled out
on the ground below her, their heads touching, their mouths open greedily. Her
blood had spattered all over their faces. She shuddered. How long had they been
there, she thought, just lying there like fat leaches, letting her blood rain
down on them and lapping it up?

"Pleasant sleep?"
Jagoda called.

She kicked her legs about in an effort to try
and break the ropes that bound her feet—an easy task if her powers had been in
full swing. The ropes held.

Movement below, shadows shifting. Junger and
Jagoda rose from the ground.

"Time for some rape," Junger said.
"We want you soiled, torn, desecrated."

"Yes," agreed the other, curling his
fingers around a long black tendril shooting from his beard. "The zombies
will take you first, then, after a very special surprise, we will fuck what
remains." He turned his eyes from her face to the rope from which she was
suspended, and at this motion the cord snapped.

Before she had time to
brace herself, her bare pelvis struck first and hard.
Pain flared through
her, and she cried out. She noticed the ground was strangely warm below her and
wondered if that was because the Balaklava had
been resting there. Quickly, she attempted to get to her feet, but the bindings
made her clumsy. She fell over again. This time her breath was knocked from her
so that even with the rope no longer hindering her larynx, she still couldn't
breathe.

Finally, after resting a moment, she found
enough strength to say, "Please ... don't do this. I ... I didn't …
For
God's sakes, what did I ever do to you!?
"

She looked back and forth between them, hoping
for one of them to budge, to waver. That's all she wanted, in
all the
fucking world, was just a goddamned waver!

"Nothing," Junger answered. "You
did nothing at all. We do this because your suffering makes great Art.”

At a movement of his hand, the ropes binding her
feet broke so that her legs were free to spread. Now she was wide open for assault.

The Balaklava
stepped backwards, outside the circle of zombies that even now began to shrink
in diameter, to close in like the noose around her neck. Within seconds they
were only a few feet away.

For a moment, some confusion gripped their ranks
as they silently debated who would have her first. Then they chose, and the man
nearest her feet stepped forward.

Gritting her teeth, she squeezed her knees
together tightly. Thoughts ran together frantically in her head, but there
wasn't anything she could think of that would save her. When finally it hit
home that she was actually going to die here, she tried to figure out how, in
this situation, she could die with dignity, and the awful thing was that she
couldn't think of a way.

The creature nearest her legs—a bearded man who
appeared to have died in his early forties and who wore the remains of a dress
tuxedo from the same decade—stepped forward, even as those zombies to either
side of her moved in to pin her down. The bearded zombie unzipped his zipper
and reached his hand inside—

A thigh-bone erupted from his forehead.

For a second he tottered, then slowly fell
forward and came to rest on his knees, his upper half sprawled across Danielle
as if in worship.

The others dropped her to the ground and wheeled
about. Knocking the truly dead zombie off her, she crawled to the side, but Junger
and Jagoda placed themselves before her.

Beyond them, she saw her savior: Kiernevar, the
bone-thrower, wearing only a loincloth and an extra skin of his own feces. She’d
never been
more glad
to see anybody in her entire
life. At that moment, she remembered Cloire’s prophetic words of just a few
hours ago. For now, in whatever sick game of intrigue was involved here,
Kiernevar was a player.