Bring Out Your Dead (2 page)

“
It’s bound to be. How
many zombies do you normally have to deal with?”

I rubbed the back of my neck again, and
wished for a couple of aspirins. “Usually fewer than five a year
are raised by intervention.”

“
Intervention? You make it
sound like revenants are drugs users.”

I smiled. “Intervention in this case means
someone hires a necromancer, or petitions a being of power to raise
the dead. It’s not an easy process. Because Salvaticus is
traditionally the time of rebirth, the Society says we can expect
more than three hundred new revenants over the next few days. Thank
goodness this only happens every five hundred years. All the
counselors are working around the clock to cope with the influx.
Speaking of which, if my clients are playing poker in the hall, I’d
best see to them before the neighbors start to complain about naked
revenants. Sally?” I poked my head out into the flat’s hall.

“
Oui? Vous
called?”

“
Can you show in the next
person? And please—watch your language. Some of these people have
been dead for over a hundred years, and they’re bound to be
scandalized by any cursing.”

My erstwhile spirit guide
snorted and rolled her eyes as she drifted toward the front door.
“
Années du
hundred is nothing
. Moi, je
will be
cent
soixante-douze
next March.”

“
And you don’t look a day
over one hundred and fifty,” I said. “Please give the client the
welcome packet, and tell him or her I’ll be right there. I need to
talk to Noelle first.”

“
It will have to be
quick,” Noelle said, glancing at the clock and saving her file.
“I’m on duty tonight in the Tower of London’s portal. It’s been
spewing out huge numbers of imps the last few nights, and the
Tower’s regular Guardian is too overwhelmed to cope with all the
crossovers.”

I frowned. “Salvaticus is the time of
rebirth for revenants. Why would that make the imps come into our
world?”

“
Lots of reasons,” Noelle
said, snatching up her bag of tools and a small purse. “It’s the
week before Vexamen, the time of upheaval in Abaddon when demon
lords struggle with one another for surpremacy. Those battles
generate an excess amount of dark power, so the imps and other
beings use that to access portals that would normally be beyond
their abilities. And speaking of that, I wanted to remind you to be
especially careful when you go out.”

“
Me?” I watched as she
crossed over to her bedroom window and drew a protection ward on
it, then followed when she marched out and repeated the process on
all the windows in the flat. “What are you doing? I thought you
warded the flat every weekend.”

“
Those are normal
household protection wards. These are different—these will keep any
being of dark powers out. They don’t last as long as the others.
I’m drawing them because you’re at risk right now.”

She turned to face me as Sally showed a
middle-aged woman into the sitting room. I told the woman I’d be
with her in a minute.

“
What are you talking
about?” I asked Noelle in a low voice. “Why am
I
at risk? It’s not like I’m a sex
bunny or anything like that.”

“
You’re sex bunny enough
to capture five husbands,” Noelle said with a laugh.

I thinned my lips. “They weren’t captured.
They were all very nice men, considerate and thoughtful, if a
bit…well, that’s not a discussion for today.”

“
That’s not the danger I
was talking about, but you know full well you’re attractive
enough.
You’re
not cursed with red hair and freckles. No one takes you
seriously when you have red hair and freckles.”

I smiled. Noelle’s hair and fair skin were
the bane of her existence. “Oh, you’re not going to tell me that
men don’t like red hair, because I know that’s not true. You have
lots of boyfriends.”

“
Perhaps, but there was
only one who really mattered.” She stopped next to a desk, her face
drawn.

I put an arm around her. I had been in the
country visiting a friend when she had met, been madly attracted
to, and ultimately rejected by a mysterious man about whom she was
oddly reticent to speak. “I’m sorry, Belle—I don’t mean to be a wet
blanket about this, but it…well, it still hurts.”

“
Men are scum,” I said
sympathetically. “Most, that is. Certainly the one who dumped you
is.”

“
He didn’t dump me so much
as reject what I had to offer him,” she said with a sad little
sigh. “I just don’t know how he could do that. It doesn’t seem
possible—it was against all the rules—but he did.”

I murmured platitudes, feeling her pain. “I
know it’s hard now. It’s only been, what, seven months? But in
time, you’ll realize that this man was not meant for you.”

“
That’s just the
problem—he
was
meant for me,” she said, turning away. “He was…oh, what does
it matter? He refused me, and that was the end of it.”

“
Then more fool him. You
are charming, attractive, smart, and a wonderful person. And for
the record, I quite like your red hair and freckles.”

She laughed and gave me a hug. “And I like
your dark hair and gray eyes, but that’s beside the point. We’re
quite a pair, aren’t we?”

“
I still don’t see what
any of this has to do with Salvaticus.”

“
Then you’re being
unusually obtuse. You must know that your double soul presents an
extreme temptation to any servants of demon lords who are
about.”

My smile faded. I’d never been too
comfortable with my unusual status.

“
Anyone
with my handicap will be a target,” I said,
crossing my arms and looking out the window at the rainy London
morning. A thin drizzle spotted the window and made the street
gleam damply, casting a gloom over the day that had me shivering
slightly.

“
Oh, for heaven’s sake,
you aren’t handicapped. You’re unique! There aren’t that many of
you around, are there?” she asked, her head tipped to the side as
she continued to study me, evidently cheered out of her own glums
by my moodiness.

I shifted restlessly, uncomfortable with
such close scrutiny.

“
That wasn’t a
condemnation, you know,” she said softly, then tsked when the
sitting room clock chimed. “Bloody hell, I’m late. Just watch
yourself. Stay in and don’t go out for the next few days just to be
sure.”

She was off to the front door, snatching up
her coat and umbrella en route.

“
I can’t stay in—I have to
go tutor a new child this afternoon who was sent down from his
school.”

“
Cancel.”

“
I can’t! I need the
money. I’m tired of borrowing from you just to pay for groceries
and things.”

She paused at the door to make a face. “Why
you continue to spend every spare minute of your time with that
Society when they don’t pay you—”

“
You know why I volunteer
with them. They need me. It’s not their fault they don’t have the
budget to pay their counselors. I was lucky to get this tutoring
job, so I’m not going to cancel and risk losing the only source of
income I have.”

She touched a blue and green tapestry that
hung on the hall wall. “You could always sell some hangings.”

I wrapped my arms around my waist, a little
prick of pain burning deep within me. “I’ve sold my loom. I’ve sold
all my wools and other equipment. I’ve sold everything I could, but
that piece is the only thing I have left of myself. I can’t sell
it, I just can’t.”

Noelle smiled. “I’m not asking you to,
Belle. I know how much this means to you. Don’t worry about
money—we’ll get by somehow. I can always take on some extra work if
need be. Just stay here and take care of your zombies.”

“
Revenants,” I said
automatically as she slipped out the door, her red curls bobbing
madly.

Worry held me in its ever-present grip,
tightening across my chest until every breath was an effort to
take. Noelle might be willing to do my share as well as hers, but
that was a situation I couldn’t tolerate. Despite her warning about
being a target of the dark powers, I had to go to the tutoring job.
A girl’s pride could only take so many blows.

“
Vous est
coming?” Sally asked, poking her head through the
door. I rubbed the goose bumps on my arms that remained as Noelle’s
words echoed in my head. “
Qu’est-ce
something I can’t remember that means what’s up?
You look
tres
worried.”

“
Nothing’s wrong, and yes,
I’m coming. I’m not worried, it’s just…” I rubbed my arms again,
trying to disburse the somber feeling that had been left in the
wake of Noelle’s warning. “It’s nothing. Just someone walking over
my grave.”

Sally pursed her lips but said nothing as I
entered the sitting room. Considering the obvious, I counted that
as a minor miracle.

Chapter Two

“
Yip, yip!”

“
Oh God, not more…”
Followed by a dozen or so tiny yellow imps, I burst out of the tube
station and ran like a maniac down the street, tossing apologies
over my shoulder as I occasionally bumped into people on their way
home. It was early evening, and the sodden sky did nothing to
lighten the way as I raced down streets, cut through alleys,
leaping over fences and rubbish bins in the manner of a hyperactive
Olympic hurdler. “Pardon me. So sorry. My apologies,
sir.”

“
Belle!
Vous êtes
banging my
head
dans la
bottle of water!”

“
I’m a little busy at the
moment, Sally,” I muttered through gritted teeth. Mindful of my
spirit guide’s head, I spun around the corner as carefully as
possible, but ended up skidding on the wet pavement and slamming
into a large figure that loomed up out of nowhere.

“
Oooph,” the man grunted
as I collided with him, falling backward. Inside my purse, Sally
yelled out copious curses in mangled French.

My arms flailed as I attempted to regain my
balance, but it did no good. We fell in a tangled heap of arms and
legs, my nose bumping his cheekbone, his warm lips pressed against
mine. For a moment I lay stunned—both by the blow and the fact that
I was inadvertantly kissing a total stranger.

I opened my mouth to
apologize, but his arms tightened around me. His lips moved,
sending little zings of excitement down my body. For a moment, I
could taste blood, but the second his tongue swirled across my lip,
teasing me,
tasting
me, all thoughts flew out of my head.

He must have been eating a spicy sweet or
chewing clove gum or something, because his mouth tasted of a
heavenly ambrosia I couldn’t begin to put into words. A distant
part of my brain was shocked that I was lying on a stranger in the
middle of a London street, surrounded by passersby as I kissed him
with everything I was worth. But at that moment all I wanted was to
enjoy the spicy sweetness his mouth offered.

His body stiffened. I had a momentary
glimpse of gray-blue eyes flashing surprise beneath the black rim
of a fedora before they narrowed and he spoke. “Beloved!”

The sound of his voice brought me back to
reality. My cheeks flamed with embarassment as I squirmed out of
his hold. I got to my feet and gathered my bag from where it had
fallen. “I’m so very sorry, sir. There’s no excuse for my actions
other than the ground was wet, and I’m being chased—”

“
Tabernak!
Vous…vous…
whatever it is…you would like to
murder
moi
?”

The man leaped up with a grace I lacked,
looking toward the voice issuing from my bag.

“
Sorry. It’s a little
confusing, isn’t it? That’s actually my spirit—” I started to
explain, still red-cheeked at my uninhibited display. But at that
moment, the imps found me.

“
Yip, yip, yip,” clamored
the murderous little monsters (imps seldom have good on their
minds) as they poured around the corner in a yellow wave of
menace.

“
Bloody hell!” I scanned
the street quickly, searching for the best escape route, but before
I could make a decision, the man shoved me toward the entrance to a
narrow unlit alley.

“
Down there. Quickly!” he
ordered, turning to block the alley with his body. I hesitated a
moment, unwilling to place my Good Samaritan in potential danger,
worried that he could be harmed. “Run, you foolish woman. I won’t
be harmed.”

I didn’t wait for him to tell me twice. I
ran, my arms outstretched in a blind attempt to avoid trash bins
and boxes of refuse that hid in the darkness.

“
Belle!
J’ai entendu le
voice of
a man. Who was it?”

“
Sally, I really don’t
have time—ow! Damn it, this is ridiculous.”

The tiny alley ran behind a row of connected
buildings, allowing little light to intrude from the shops and
streetlights. Judging by the smell of rodent droppings and urine, I
gathered the alley was not the safe haven I had hoped it would be.
I swore again as my shin connected with something hard and pointy,
then turned back to see how my champion was doing, prepared to go
to his rescue if he was being overwhelmed. All I could see was his
silhouette in the entrance of the alley, bobbing and weaving as he
beat off the imp attackers.