Two silver bullets apiece later, Narda and Enan had joined the Giggler on the ground. I stood, walked over to the bodies, reloaded, and pumped another couple rounds into their hearts, just to be sure.
Devona had untangled herself from Narda’s wire. “I take it the veinburn didn’t affect you. Nice acting job.”
“What can I say? I was in drama club in high school.” I examined the patches of plaskin on the forms of the dead vampires. I wondered if the substance might help fend off my decay, but I decided it probably wouldn’t. The plaskin likely only worked on living tissue. No loss; I don’t look good in blue anyway.
Devona gazed at the remains of the Red Tide members. “Makes it rather difficult to question them, doesn’t it? Their being dead and all.”
“You complaining?”
She smiled. “Not in the slightest. But it does narrow our options.”
“The Red Tide has to get its technology somewhere, and the only Darklord enamored of technology is Varvara. But none of this strikes me as her style. Varvara’s charming, fun, and she’d betray her best friend in a heartbeat if there was a laugh in it, but the Red Tide are too declasse for her. My money’s on the Dominari. They have the connections to import technology from Earth and supply it to the Red Tide, and from what Gregor told us, the Dominari are involved in the manufacturing and testing of veinburn, which Enan possessed in abundance.”
I put my gun away and shook my arm; it felt heavy and swollen. “Stupid vamps. Not only doesn’t this stuff work on me, you’d think they’d have realized I’d need a functioning circulatory system to distribute it throughout my body.”
“What will happen to the veinburn?”
“It’ll just sit in my arm until I have it removed. Papa Chatha can do it for me. If I’m still around in a few days.” As soon as I said the words, I regretted them. It was one thing to think those kind of morbid thoughts, another to voice them.
“Oh, Matt, I wish you had told me earlier.”
“We only met a few hours ago, Devona. My situation has no bearing on your problem or on our efforts to resolve it.” I paused. “Besides, I didn’t want you worrying about me.”
“That’s sweet.” And then she did something that surprised the hell out of me. She leaned forward and gave me a kiss on the cheek. I hadn’t been kissed since I’d died, hadn’t even really been touched-in a non-violent way, that is-by a woman.
I didn’t know how to react, so I didn’t. Just stood there and looked at her. Pretty smooth, huh?
“I want you to know something, Matt. No matter whether we find the Dawnstone or not, I intend to ask my father to help you.”
Now I really didn’t know what to say. But Devona didn’t wait for a reply. “I assume we’re off to the Sprawl again?”
I nodded. “To locate either Morfran or the drug lab.” I smiled. “And I promise not to kill anyone else before we’ve had a chance to talk with them.”
You know the old punchline? You can’t get there from here. Nekropolis can be like that sometimes. To get back to the Sprawl, we had to either go through Glamere once more-definitely not an option-or pass through the Wyldwood, Dominion of Lord Amon, King of the Shapeshifters.
When I brought this up to Devona, she said, “Couldn’t we take a shortcut across the grounds of the Nightspire?”
The Nightspire rests on a small island in the middle of the pentagram that is Nekropolis. This island is surrounded by the fiery waters of Phlegethon, the same waters which enclose the city and separate the five Dominions from each other. But in addition to the main bridges, there is a second set of smaller ones which connect each section of the city to the Nightspire. Devona’s suggestion made sense on the surface. It would make our journey to the Sprawl far simpler and less deadly if we could walk from the Boneyard to the Nightspire, pass the bridge leading to the Wyldwood and take the one which led to the Sprawl.
“Unfortunately, it isn’t that simple. During my time here, I’ve had occasion to travel a good bit of the city. I had the same idea as you a while back and tried to cross over one of the bridges to the Nightspire.”
“What happened?”
“It didn’t work. Powerful winds buffeted me, nearly knocking me into Phlegethon. When I retreated, the winds ceased. I later learned from Gregor that the wind, which he said was caused by the invisible Furies which guard the Nightspire, repels all who attempt to cross-not including the Darklords, of course-unless they are accompanied by one of Dis’s representatives.”
“So that’s out then,” Devona said. “And we can’t risk another encounter with Lady Talaith.”
“I’d rather not,” I admitted.
“Which leaves only the Wyldwood.”
“Talk about Scylla and Charybdis.”
Her eyebrows rose. “I didn’t realize you were so well read.”
“Yeah, well, when you don’t sleep, eat or go to the bathroom anymore, you have a lot of extra time for reading. Let’s go. And on the way, maybe you can talk me out of it.”
SIXTEEN
Before leaving the Boneyard, Devona and I discussed the best way to make it through the Wyldwood. Devona argued that the Accord which established unrestricted travel on the Obsidian Way would protect us in the Wyldwood, and so we should stay on it. I countered that might be true- if we were traveling in a vehicle, preferably a very fast one that could outpace a speeding lyke. But by walking completely unprotected out in the open, we would be marking ourselves as prey for every denizen in the Wyldwood. And Accord or no Accord, no lyke would pass up the opportunity to attack a pair of morons who wouldn’t even bother trying to conceal their presence. As far as a lyke would be concerned, anyone that stupid deserved to have their flesh shredded into bloody gobbets.
“But the lykes will still be able to catch our scent, whether we’re traveling on the Way or not,” Devona said.
“Off the Way, we can move through the trees, and that will help mask our scent somewhat,” I suggested. “Plus, my zombie…uh, ambience will seem more like rotting carrion in the woods, where there’s less chance of lykes seeing me and realizing the smell is coming from a walking dead man. If they think I’m just the remnants of another lyke’s kill, they’ll leave us alone and go off in search of fresh prey.”
In the end we compromised. We’d travel overland but stick as close to the Obsidian Way as possible, so we could return to it if necessary.
We crossed the Bridge of Silent Screams, left the Obsidian Way, and entered the dense tangle of forest that was the Wyldwood. We picked our way carefully through the underbrush, searching for a path and trying not to make too much noise lest we attract the attention of any lykes that might be nearby. Lykes were chaotic enough outside their Dominion, but here they were totally wild, killing on sight any who dared attempt to cross their land. Like I said, Devona and I made our way very carefully.
Despite the thickness of the forest, we could still see well enough. Some strange quality of Umbriel’s shadowy light? Or maybe Lord Amon’s magic was responsible. Whichever, I was grateful. Otherwise, I would have been totally dependent on Devona’s vampire vision to lead me-and I don’t like being dependent.
Still, being able to see didn’t help us navigate. I’d been a city boy all my life and death, and Devona had spent most of her existence within the Cathedral and the surrounding environs of Gothtown. Neither of us was exactly a skilled outdoorsman. In order to make sure we didn’t stray too far from the Obsidian Way, Devona had to climb trees a number of times to check the position of Umbriel and get a fix on our location. She went up with an easy grace and came down the same way, and watching her, admiring her strength and beauty, I felt a strange tightness in my chest. I told myself it was probably the result of the numerous injuries I’d sustained since taking on Devona’s case, but I knew better.
After one such check, Devona climbed down from a large oak, a deep scowl on her face and said, “As near as I can tell, we’ve been going in circles-and I couldn’t see any sign of the Way.”