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"And what would be the point of that if their majicks were not for naught?"
the fortune-teller elaborated.
"Not for what?"
"Neutralized," Olive translated, pouring more sanguinary snackage into my mug
before I could stop her.
"Elven magic defeated by nanotechnology?" I sighed. "It's about time that
crap those Nazi boojums injected into me did something worthwhile." The
nanobots that swarmed through my bloodstream and crawled through my tissues
had yet to activate in any meaningful way. Beyond setting off the security
scanners at the airport, that is.
Zotz nodded sagely. "The magic of the Sidhe is nullified by cold iron."
I started to take another drink but stopped. "Whoa, Bats! When did you become
an expert on the Fey Folk?" The ancient demon's preferred method of
information gathering and research was watching television. Lots and lots of
television. It was only in the past month that I had been able to get him a
library card and out the door to a more literary form of inquiry and
examination.
"Lately I find that it is not enough to learn the ways of this time and
culture," he said. "I think it wise to understand the ways of those tribes and
forms which exist outside of natural law and perception."
"So you're deep in the stacks, dusting off tomes that pull back the veil on
the unseen kingdoms?" I tried of sip of my now "freshened" drink. Too hot now.
And the older contents had curdled a bit and risen to the top. No wonder
jugulars were still the carafe of choice for the fanged crowd.
He shook his head. "I use the library's computers to surf the internet. Did
you know that 'fairy' also means homosexual?"
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I started to choke. Olive reached over and laid a manicured hand on his
shoulder. "When Mister Chris is able to talk I'm sure he'll want to tell you
how unreliable the internet can be as a research tool."
Zotz considered and nodded. "That would explain the librarians' consternation
over some of the source materials that I have accessed."
"Consternation?" I repeated weakly.
"They seemed quite distressed."
Fenris cleared his throat after half a beat. "What are nanobots?" he asked.
Glances were exchanged. Perhaps too much personal intel already had been.
"We have some personal business to discuss . . ." Mama Samm said with a
slight nod of her head.
" . . . and, rather than bore our guests," Olive added diplomatically, "why
don't you take them up topside, Jamal? Where they can enjoy the sun."
We all turned and looked at Olive's nephew. He had tucked himself down
against the wall, next to the corner fireplace, across from the helm. The
shadows and his dark skin had provided camouflage up till now. Twin qualities
of stillness and silence conjoined to chameleon him out of sight and mind. The
gangly teenager unfolded slowly, standing up, still not uttering a word.
Jamal had been quite loquacious for the first seventeen years of his life.
Perhaps I should rephrase that: Jamal was quite the chatterbox for theentire
seventeen years of his life. Which had ended last year in the destruction of
the BioWeb laboratories. Now he just sat or stood very quietly until asked to
move. He performed simple tasks with an economy of movement. He never slept.
Instead he would gaze straight ahead, his cloudy eyes unfocused, and seem to
listen to distant music no one else could hear. He never spoke unless spoken
to. And never answered in more than one or two syllables.
I could never decide which I felt the most guilt over: that running errands
for me had put him in harm's way and, eventually, brought about his murder?
Or that, in bringing him back to the land of the semi-living with an infusion
of my own tainted blood, I may have done more harm than good?
Fenris got up and stood near Jamal. "No need to keep us occupied out of
earshot," he said. "We can get in a little run, pick up some supplies, pack,
make preparations for tomorrow's return trip." He looked over at Mama Samm.
"Unless you'd like to leave later today?"
"Honey, I gots to sleep before I makes a long drive down to Nawlins. I's an
old womans." The serious voice was gone and the old shuck 'n' jive mask was
back, firmly in place.
Volpea stood a bit reluctantly, I thought. Both enforcers were probably under
orders to bring back as much intelligence as they could gather. So whatever we
didn't want to discuss in front of them was surely eavesdrop-worthy.
"Jamal will see you to shore, then," Olive said.
Jamal didn't require a direct order. He seemed to process well enough most of
the time though you'd be hard pressed so find anyone more close-mouthed about
it. But he made no further movement toward the door.
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"Jamal?" Olive asked.
Her nephew's lips moved. A sound of sorts emerged.
"What is it, baby?"
"Tu-lu," he finally muttered.
"What?" I'm not sure who asked that question. Maybe we all did.
"Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Tulu," Jamal rasped, "R'lyeh wgah'nagl ftagn . . ."
We all sat there for a minute, stunned. Was it that Jamal had spoken in
multiple syllables? Or that the words coming out of his mouth were pure
gibberish? Or that the gibberish sounded like some actual, foreign language?
Some terrible, unspeakable language?
Perhaps it was the effect of strange sounds emerging from the vocal apparatus
of a dead man.
And then Jamal raised his hand and gestured toward me with a drooping,
clawlike hand. "He's coming, Mister Chris! He will wake and the world will
fall into dreams of madness!"
And then he started to scream.
Chapter Three
If this was one of those "dreams of madness," it didn't start out so bad.
I was eight years old again along with Scotty Steadman. Cecil Rosewood was
barely seven but acted nine.
As the school system didn't offer "accelerated alternatives," they had
declared Rosewood an honorary eight-year-old and bumped him up to Mrs.
Standhart's third-grade classroom.
It wasn't an immediate fit. Rosey was smaller than the rest of us. Worse, he
was smarter than the rest of us. Since Steadman and I were less intimidated by
either factor, he ended up under our social tutelage, running with the two of
us even when school was out: evenings, weekends, summers yet to come . . .
We had just spent another Friday night in Scotty's tree house, and then
slipped next door, down into the family room in my parent's basement: the
Saturday morning ritual of cartoons and breakfast.
It was already warm out and Steadman was totally at home in his Underoos both
fashion statement and practical choice as the sleeping bags had turned us all
sweaty and disheveled. The Steadmeister held the opinion that pajamas were too
babyish for such mature eight-year-olds as ourselves. Easy enough to say when
your underwear approximates Batman's crime-fighting costume. It lent an air of
daring to the skinny, freckled kid something that would otherwise elude him
into his all-too-brief adulthood.
Scott Steadman would die in an automobile accident at the age of
twenty-three.
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Cecil Rosewood, whom the rest of our classmates called "Poindexter," went the
sartorial opposite. He wore jammies with feet. Perhaps his mother made them:
Sears & Roebuck had phased out pj's with enclosed footwear back when I was
graduating toilet training. If it hadn't been for the mashed potatoes, we
would have ragged him unmercifully. Rosey had made the groundbreaking
discovery that properly stuffed with mashed potatoes pajama booties
approximated the low-g effects of a moonwalk for a third-grader playing
astronaut.
Poindexter was a pioneer.
As for me? Since my mother was of the opinion that underwear even the sort
designed for the Bat-cave was inadequate for warding off the effects of [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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