From Darkness Comes: The Horror Box Set (14 page)

“And that probably sucks,” I tried to commiserate. “But I think a zombie apocalypse would be much worse than whatever your little problem might be.”

“Zombie apocalypse!” Rosanna scoffed. “You have been watching too many movies!”

“Well then
, why don’t you fill me in if you’re so smart.”

“For one, Alessa—or whatever she is calling herself these days—can’t keep her zombies from falling apart. The ones that I have seen are deteriorating so fast that I doubt they could last long enough to bite somebody. And if they are that weak, then I doubt that they could even pass on the spell.”

“Spell?” I asked. “Don’t you mean the infection?” I wanted to ask about this other name I kept hearing, but my brain gets too cluttered. I needed to focus on the bits I felt were important.

“Again with too much of the movies or comic books or whatever your source is. Zombies are a magical creature. They have to be imbued with a very powerful spell if they are going to be the type of zombie to create other zombies. Seriously, how could something like just a bite or scratch turn a person into a zombie? It’s magic…it
certainly is not something seriously scary like AIDS.”

Now I was probably more confused than I had been before I met her. Rosanna was
saying a whole bunch of stuff, but my mind was not wrapping around the big picture. It was at moments like this that I really missed Lisa.

“But if she is the real reason for the Black Plague, how did it become so wide spread if not by the bite?”

“Oh, the bite has something to do with it, but there is more to it than just being bitten,” Rosanna explained. “When a zombie is created to spread its condition to the living, they can only do so within limits. After a dozen or so, they expire and either collapse or just wander aimlessly.”

“Like they run out of gas or something?”

“In a way…yes. That is why when you read about the plague, it says that all those people died. That part is correct, but The Queen of the Zombies had to make a few zombies a day and move before being discovered. Then she would make more. The spread had more to do with her being on the run than what the actual zombies did.”

“But if she was trying to wipe out the world…” This is the part I really didn’t understand. Who would actually want to wipe out the entire world?

“Actually, she was just trying to establish her own kingdom. The problem that she faced is that, unlike tyrannical rulers who might be mean or oppressive, people actually had to be dead to live under the reign of The Queen of the Zombies,” Rosanna explained. “They are the perfect…citizen for a lazy ruler. They do what they are told until they are told to stop or do something else. Their most fearsome aspect is that they are a force to be reckoned with on a battlefield.”

“So what is her game now? If she knows anything at all, she has to know that nobody here would want to be dead
any more than they did in the past.”

“I don’t think she wants to wipe out the world,” Rosanna said with a shrug. “I think that she just wants her own little place where she matters. You see, once she creates a zombie, it is completely devoted to her. It would do whatever she told it to. And she can actually communicate with them and they with her.”

“So…what…she is lonely?” That seemed a bit silly. It was certainly no reason to start wiping people out.

“Perhaps,” Rosanna said. “She can communicate with the dead in a way that she
cannot with the living.”

“Like an immigrant worker who doesn’t speak good En
glish?” I asked. I realize that probably seems racially insensitive, but it is the best thing that I can come up with, so sue me.

“Perhaps,” Rosanna replied. “The bottom line is that she has the need to surround herself with these creatures. They see her not as food or a threat, but rather something to be worshipped. They will obey her to the death.”

“Like a dog?” That might have been a better analogy than the whole immigrant worker thing.

“Do you have to ask a thousand questions all the time, or are you just trying to annoy me? It seems like every single time I answer you, you ask me something else…
and most of what you are asking is completely irrelevant.”

“Listen, witch,” somehow this entire conversation had just taken a n
asty turn and I had no idea why, “I am new to all this supernatural crap. If you want me to deal with this problem, lose the attitude. Otherwise, if I have a million questions and then a million follow up questions…you just answer them. It is my ass on the line here. As it is, this job has already given me more headaches than I care to deal with.”

“What could this have possibly done to impact you?” the witch asked. “I’ve actually had my gardens stomped flat. I make my living from little brews and potions that I
make for a fee. It is my livelihood. Without my garden, I am at the mercy of the council and must offer my services to the regional psychic whenever she sees fit to grace me with a job that is beneath her. Do you have any idea…” Rosanna’s voice trailed off as she realized not only what she was saying, but to whom she was saying it.

“I apologize,” she whispered. “I meant no disrespect. It is just that I have only been free of Morgan’s employment for the past year. I hated feeling like I was something that she—”

“Scraped off her shoe!” I interrupted. “I know, right? It is like, she comes to you with the job and then acts like you are a complete idiot!”

“And she took my familiar a few years ago when I wasn’t performing up to her standards and kept her
for several months. When I got her back…she was…changed.”

“Into a vampire?” I asked, thinking about Lisa and what may have befallen her.

“My cat? Hardly,” Rosanna said with a laugh.

“Sorry, just that I have this friend named Lisa who has been with me since right after I turned. She has been like my right hand. I rely on her probably more than a grown woman should considering that Lisa is just a teenager.”

“Age has very little to do with a person’s mindset,” Rosanna said in as serious of a tone as I’d heard from her so far. “When a witch comes into her powers, it is usually around her first bleeding. She is expected to learn how to control her powers within a few months.”

“Yes, well I’m still a grown woman who should have a be
tter grasp on things than I do.”

“But you say that Morgan has taken this Lisa from you?” Rosanna asked.

“She didn’t so much take her as they shared a moment and then there was some whispering. After that, Lisa decided to leave.”

“And what sort of creature is Lisa?”

When Rosanna asked that, at first I was taken aback. I mean, what sort of a question was that? Then I remembered that she is a witch and I am a ghoul. It was actually a very good question.

“She is a human.”

“A
teen
human?” Rosanna sputtered. “I had no idea that a ghoul could coexist with a human…much less a teenage girl human.”

“It’s not like I would eat her or something,” I huffed. “She is perfectly safe with me.”

“Perhaps things have changed over the centuries,” Rosanna said with some serious doubt ringing in her voice.

“What is that supposed to mean?”

“It’s just that, for as long as I’ve been aware of their existence, ghouls are more like the assassins of the supernatural world. It is said that there is no more fierce a fighter than a ghoul. They are almost impervious to pain, and possess great power in battle. And in this day and age, their ability to…if you will excuse the blatancy…eat the evidence—”

“Wait a second,” I interrupted. “You are saying that my s
upernatural job description is basically that of a killer?”

“That is one way to l
ook at it. It’s just that ghouls were always sought by any who desired to rise to power. They are killing machines. Their ability to ignore pain is the thing of legends. To capture one is pointless because they are immune to torture.”

“But what about the sun? I burn like an albino in the desert.”

I imagine that most of you are now immune to my lack of political correctness. Seriously, you can’t say midget, you can’t say black or oriental, and somebody just told me that albino is insensitive. Well that settles it; I am demanding that my publisher post something in the description of this series about my so-called insensitivity. I’ll be damned if I am going to tiptoe through the PC crap. I bet most of you don’t either unless your more ‘worldly’ friends are around. C’mon, you know the ones I am talking about, the type who refuses to say “Merry Christmas” and all that.

To quote one of my heroes, Joan Rivers, “Can we talk?” I bet if you are reading this…or even more accurately…
still
reading this book, then you are the kind of person who watches
South Park
and wishes you’d have thought to make the same observations about whatever or whoever they are making fun of currently. More accurately, you wish you could say some of it in public without having the locals show up with torches and pitchforks.

I’m not saying that there isn’t a line. But most people don’t even get close enough to see the line these days. I was with some friends at lunch one day and one of the girls said something was “totally gay.” Now from the reaction of one of the other ladies sitting at the table, you would have thought that the “N-word” had been used. (Yes, that is a line I will not cross. The Black community and
Eminem can say what they like…but I will take a pass on that one.)

“Ava!” Rosanna yelled.

Damn, I was doing it again, wasn’t I?

“Did you hear anything that I just said?”

I gave a sheepish shake of the head.
Bad Ava…that is a very bad Ava.

“I said that it is a law in the supernatural community. Each of us, for some reason or another has issues with the sun.
That is considered the equivalent of the nuclear option. Anybody who might consider using it knows that supernaturals from around the world would hunt them down and kill them. Enemies would set aside their differences to kill whoever would consider using the sun as a weapon.”

“Wait, so how are witches bothered by the sun?” I knew for a fact that it burned my skin instantly. I also knew that it was death to a vampire, but what could it possibly do to a witch?

“If we are exposed to the sun for a period of four hours, it erases our power,” Rosanna said after a brief pause. I think she was weighing the trust level. She was about to expose a serious weakness. In the end, I imagine that she knew I would find out one way or the other.

“Seems to me like a simple burning at the stake would be much quicker.” I
really do have that problem of speaking before thinking. I clamped my mouth shut and dared to risk a look at Rosanna. She was smiling! WTF?

“You are obviously referring to the old stories about Salem and the trials.”

I nodded. I was a little surprised that she wasn’t fuming. I mean, that would be like cracking slavery jokes with the head of the NAACP or Spike Lee.

“Do you think that a human would have stood a chance had they been dealing with any
real
witches?” She had a point. “A real witch would have known what was coming and considering the primitive times that this took place, it would have been nothing for her to wipe out the entire town.”

“You always say her…like as in one. What about covens?” I asked. I figured since she was so full of information, and obv
iously not shy about sharing, I should ask whatever came to mind. You never know when that information will come in handy.

“Covens!” Rosanna laughed. If she would have been drin
king something, it would have shot out her nose. “Covens are silly little human constructs. The thing about mortals is that they seek acceptance. Even when they are trying to seem like they are on the fringe and unique, they always tend to surround themselves with likeminded individuals.”

“So you witches don’t gather and perform rituals while dancing naked under the light of the moon.”

“Would you want somebody watching you dance naked?” she asked. “Especially another woman?”

“Good point,” I agreed.

“But we have strayed well off the subject of The Queen of the Zombies,” Rosanna sighed.

“And apparently out of town,” I added.

I looked around and realized that we had driven out into the middle of nowhere. There was nothing but trees and more trees surrounding us.

I turned us around and headed back to town. Rosanna was silent as I drove. I imagine that she was afraid to say anything. For as grouchy as she got about me asking too many questions, she was certainly a fountain of information. That girl could talk. I decided to test something.

“So what did losing your familiar do to you? Did it hurt?”

“I was powerless for almost a month. It is like an illness. And then, once I recovered, I had to summon a new one and
then create the bond from scratch.”

“But I thought you said the other one came back?”

“I was forced to put her down. She was no longer an open channel for my magic.”