Chasing the Dragon (24 page)

The misters stopped. Down on the floor the flowers of night-dryads
bloomed and their strange smell of old bookcases and woodsmoke
slowly filled the air. The luminescent spores glowed faintly as they coated the tubs of grass. The gel on Zal's face warmed another degree in
response to the bed's programming and started to liquefy, running very
slowly down across his cheeks, nose, chin, forehead. Thin sheets of old,
dead skin began to peel off with the movement.

Lila folded and refolded the elven clothes. She recognised them by
and by. Sarasilien had worn them as lab clothes, washed them, put
them away and forgotten them. They were quite threadbare, although
the magical signs still glimmered in and out of the weave if you held
it at the right angle to see. She put them on top of the mound of silver
blanket, in case they had the power to do any good. Surely they would
do no harm.

"How am I? I'm okay. I'm fine thanks. I just talk like a moron and
I do things without understanding them and I feel quite horrible most
of the time. I'm full of hate, that's the problem. And rage. But they're
okay because underneath them is the sadness and I can't ... I
can't ..." She pulled the topshirt off the pile of clothes and screwed it
up, mashing it onto her face, stuffing it in her mouth and against her
eyes, but it didn't block out all the howling scream and it didn't help
at all in making it stop.

iz Black?"

The voice jolted her awake. She was face down, head on hands,
hands and arms resting on the edge of the bed. A steamy wetness
clung to her face-the shirt. She sat up and peeled it off. It fell heavily
into her hands, warm and fleshy, slimed with snot so that she quickly
rubbed at her nose and mouth with the drier edges. There was a savage
aching in her throat and her head. Moonlight glared off the heat
blanket, making her wince and blink. "Yes?" Only the corset's rigid,
unyielding demand kept her from wobbling as her legs unlocked from
their AI-determined position of rest and let her turn around.

She put the shirt down and rubbed her face with both hands in an
effort to wake up before she thought to use chemicals and let her insystem pharmacy dose her with uppers. The drugs took effect rapidly,
pushing her back into the speed and anxiety of the moment with
hellish acceleration that left her feelings behind entirely. Her chest felt
like someone had shotgunned it from the inside, but the iron bones of
the dress held that wound in check.

A demon in human form was standing in front of her. He was tall
and magnificently handsome, though that was no surprise-she'd never seen an ugly one in changed state. He wore a complicated silk
robe that revealed a great deal of skin here and there whilst fitting
human standards of modesty. His body was the colour of a midday
storm, his hair twisting and lifting of its own accord to float on the
lightest currents of air. The theatrical silliness of it reminded her of
Poppy, the faery singer. Poppy had tried to save Zal from the Giantkiller's vengeance, and now she was dead for her pains. Lila forcibly
hauled her sharpening attention away as she remembered Poppy, the
stupid kind vacuity of her and her foolish act of defiance. In life Poppy
had annoyed her and been the kind of girl Lila had always mistrusted
and envied, but Poppy had never noticed Lila's animosity or been put
off by her aloof manner. Now was not the time to think of ill-judged
acts of love and fury and bodies rolling cold in black water.

The demon addressing Lila was a water demon of some kind she
guessed, by the look and the exacting distance from his body at which
he held the clay crucible in its glowing wire frame.

"I am Agent Vadrahazeen. Your elemental," he said, and put the
heavy container down, stepping aside from it quickly. "I am sorry I am
late." He bowed low to her, even his azure eyes ducking for an instant
in one of the most submissive gestures. A normal demon of middling
standings would make such obeisances only to royalty, so either he was
peasant stock or Teazle had been boasting much less than she'd imagined and was in far greater danger.

Lila's heart sank another notch to a position somewhere near her
boots, and she looked at the clock-three in the morning. She rubbed
her chest, high over the bodice where she was able, but it did nothing
to ease the ache. "What kept you?" She bent down to examine the crucible and saw the demon's strange feet close up-cloven pads like a
camel's, broad and strong with a claw tip just visible on each part,
painted emerald green and wet with some type of mild venom. They
never managed to get rid of all their characteristics in the change of
form. Teazle always had a tail. This one apparently had feet.

The crucible was wired shut and marked with a great deal of
demonic symbols intended to maintain a lock and prevent the wire
from melting, though they were fighting a losing battle in Otopia's
primaterial atmosphere. It was extremely hot-enough to frizzle and
crisp a stray scrap of the dress that dangled too close to it. At least the
floor was made of tiles in here, so it hadn't started to burn. She moved
back to a more comfortable point as the demon started to talk and
studied it, wondering what she was going to do.

"Teazle Sikarza has gone missing."

Thoughts of the present dilemma fled instantly from her mind.
"What?"

"White Death is lost." The water demon's soft, liquid eyes were a
perfect Prussian blue as they delighted in sharing this information. He
was drinking in the effect it had on her, and Lila felt her face steel over
as she fought with him. "At least, the judges of Bathshebat cannot
find him."

She got to her feet as he continued, apparently impervious to the
news, but inwardly it was eating like acid at the fragile resolve she
had. The corset creaked, and she felt the laces take themselves in a fraction. In the dark the demon didn't see fresh fabric twine down the
black-armoured length of her thighs, wrapping tight like a living
black bandage.

"Go on." Her voice remembered the tone of command she had
learned to use all the time in Demonia.

Vadrahazeen made a moue that he wasn't getting a better taste of
shock and flared his wide nostrils. "There is a great deal of commotion
surrounding the major cities as searches take place. The government
has attempted to seize his assets in absentia, in an effort to stabilize the
volatility of the commons as news spreads, but as there is no proof of
his death they are unable to proceed. Meanwhile the heirs of the various houses recently come under his aegis are seeking ways to reclaim
their power either through acts of secession and open rebellion, or else a grovelling servitude to his name in which they climb the ladder of
favour. It depends on whether they think he will return alive or not.
Armies are massing and alliances forming. Loyal vassals and family are
looking for him with their own armed regiments, large numbers of
mercenaries and any amount of scum-for-hire from all the worlds.
Until there is a body there is no progress, and with such rewards as
exist for his death many lesser demons fancy themselves a chance at
making their fortune. Whichever way matters fall the economy will be
bankrupted by gambling debts. Entire houses have staked themselves
upon the outcome. It is ripe chaos." He smiled with a warm nostalgia.

Lila frowned, a gesture that showed her genuine displeasure, if not
her alarm, and hedged her only hope. "He often goes into the wild
country to hunt for worthy rivals to fight." She gave Vadrahazeen a
scathing look. "Or to the other worlds."

The demon spread his hands out, suddenly the soul of peaceable
ambivalence. "Yes, but divining his location is a simple matter for any
seer. The enforcement officers have twenty routinely tracking him at
any time, to be sure of the legal state of his affairs. There is even a
Bound Heart beating in the High Court to verify his health at all
times. All sources say he is in Bathshebat, and alive." He moved impatiently, and she could feel his eagerness to go and participate in the
heady thrill of a mass hysterical maul.

She envisioned parties, balls, duels rife to the eyeballs with murder
and intrigue. Dance floors would be slippery with blood. Assassins
must lurk around every corner and in the slightest shadow. Demon
society must be thrilled to the core, living at a peak of frenzied delight
and terror. It would be an orgy of destruction as they found a ready
excuse to strive for the pinnacles of excess they so valued. But Vadrahazeen was clearly quite young, because he managed to master his
longing for all this and stand still.

Lila moved closer to him. Under the change his age was hard to
determine. Her mistake in assuming youth could be costly. But Teazle himself was young, barely out of the prime minister's seat. They had a
certain similarity. But she was wasting too much time on a hesitation
and he was waiting, counting every moment as a moment in which she
failed to be decisive and in which she became increasingly vulnerable.
She let it go, turned her back on him ostentatiously to check Zal, and
pointed at the red-hot clay with a small gesture of her foot as if it were
nothing. "What do I do with them?"

"It," he corrected her. "One is more than enough trouble." He
looked around the room pointedly." This is not a safe location. There
must be containment."

"I've seen them wandering in the wild in Demonia," Lila said,
meaning he'd better come up with something more than generalisations.

"We are not in Demonia," Vadrahazeen replied smoothly. "In the
basket the elemental is in a stable environment. Released here it will
either deport to Zoomenon-best case-or else burn everything in
sight until it runs out of oxygen, at which point it will then deport.
There is no aether present, and it is an aetheric being. Any fraction of
its element is enough to keep its attention, but if combustion stops
and no plasma is available it won't stick around. The other possibility
is that it is strong already and would take the chance of seeking immediate refuge with the closest aetheric source. Myself, as I am strongest,
after that you, and then the Ahrimani here, what's left of him."

Lila, who hadn't even looked at Zal once, straightened up, turned
around, and looked the demon in the face, "So, you can tell he's alive?"

"I can tell that something of his spirit remains. A flicker. As can
you. Nothing else. Your metal elementals are much more powerful
than that fragment right now." He folded his hands, still, calm.

Lila made an expression of deep indifference. "And what happens
if it ... seeks refuge?"

The demon narrowed its eyes in speculation and a wistful curiosity.
"It is a popular method of murder at dinner parties, most entertaining.
Alas, I have never seen it myself."

"Probably you don't get invited to those parties," she said comfortingly, and saw it irk him in a suitably satisfying way. "The method?"

The demon walked to the bed and looked at Zal for a long minute.
He shrugged. "Put them together, release the elemental, and pray to
whatever god you think is listening. If he hasn't got will enough to
master the energy then you should cut off his head or, if you don't wish
to be merciful, let the elemental burn him from the inside out. Either
way, same result in the end."

"There has to be something else," Lila demanded. "I've seen you all
tripping out on these things and they don't damage you."

Vadrahazeen recovered himself and put his head on one side.
"Demons who are addicted to elemental frequencies often end their
lives as prey to higher elemental forms or as accidental fodder to the
minor ones." He began to preen with superiority as he was able to lecture her. "You must not have seen enough of them to realise. And those
who don't succumb always bring a healthy tribute of some kindsomething the elemental would rather take instead. There's not a day
in Bathshebat you can't buy short ribs and burnt ends pulled off some
fried fire dancer from the night before."

"At last," Lila snarled at him, staring him down until he backed
off a step. "The one useful bit of knowledge crawls out of your brain.
Set up a containment around the bed."

"It will use all of my energy," he objected.

"Get on with it." She was implacable.

"In this world that is the best anyone could do," he hissed, and set
about withdrawing himself into a meditative state so that he could do
as she said. His demeanour was sulky, but she didn't see any rebellion
in it.

She considered going to fetch the flares and an oxygen cylinder
herself, but something about her back crawled when she thought of
leaving Zal alone with the demon. It was busy colouring itself purple
and blue-colours of insight, calm and will-but she'd seen demons flicker through the rainbow to the flat white of deadly assault in a
second, so that meant little to her. Instead she cued up a steady string
of stimulants and nutrition into her own bloodstream and sent a summons to Bentley.

The grey figure arrived a few minutes later. "Your books, and flares."

Lila looked for somewhere to put the flare sticks and the thin tube
of the oxygen cylinder, then said, "Hand them to me when I say." She
opened the first book, a tome from Sarasilien's collection, and was
about to start leafing when Bentley made a discreetly polite noise in
her throat and held out a volume that Lila hadn't requested.

Ophelia's Compendium of Bittersweet Remedies for All Occasions, it was
titled, under a thick layer of mildew that had died and dried into a vile
stain along the spine.

A certain eagerness crept into her measured tones. "Open it."

Lila opened it. Damp pages stuck together, ink running like a mad
chromatograph. Peeled apart they were utterly illegible. The whole
thing gave off a rank, fungal odour, and then she lifted a second clump
of leaves and saw that it had been carefully hollowed out at the very
centre. Inside the hole lay a memory stick, almost as old as the book
by the looks of it-even had a USB port. As she examined it more
closely she saw that this in turn was a fake-a piece of recent memory
technology masquerading as an obsolete form. The port was glued on.
Break it off and a normal crystal junction offered to grow to meet her
fingers. As soon as she accessed it, she found the elf's entire library,
meticulously catalogued, cross-referenced.