Dead Beat

There was no way I could have whipped up any magic to stop them-not with all of my power focused on keeping Corpsetaker from invading my mind. I wouldn’t be able to overcome the ghoul physically- even wounded, Xian was quick on its feet, and closing the distance fast.

I drew the.44 and sent three shots back down the alley. Corpsetaker darted to one side, but the ghoul never even slowed down. It flung one too-long arm through an arc, and there was a glitter of steel in the gloomy alley. Something hit me in the ribs nearly hard enough to knock me down, but the spell-covered leather of my duster stopped it from piercing through. A triangle of steel fell to the ground, each point sharpened and given a razor’s edge.

"All I needed," I muttered. "Ninja ghouls." I emptied the revolver at Xian. He wasn’t ten feet from me on the last shot, and I must have hit him. He jerked, careened off a wall, and stumbled, but he was a long way from down.

Corpsetaker’s will continued to erode my defenses. I had to get away from her, or she’d open up my brains like a tin of sardines-and then Xian would eat them.

The three-pointed shuriken still in my calf, I forced myself to my feet through the screaming pain. I seized my staff, hobbling in earnest this time, and struggled toward the end of the alley. My only chance was to make it to the street, to flag down a cab, somehow beg a ride from a passing car, or maybe get some help. I knew there wasn’t much hope of any of those things happening, but it was all I had.

I almost got to the end of the alley, the pain in my leg growing steadily worse-and then I abruptly lost track of what was going on.

One moment I’d been busy, I knew. I was doing something important. The next I was just standing there, sort of floundering. Whatever I’d been doing, it was right on the tip of my tongue. I knew that if I could just focus for a second, I’d be able to remember it and get back on track. My leg hurt. I knew that. And my head felt jumbled, the thoughts there, but in disarray, as if I’d gone through a drawer of folded laundry, pulled out something from the bottom, and then slapped the drawer shut again without straightening anything up.

I heard a snarl behind me, and realized that whatever I’d been doing, it was too late to get back on track now. I tried to turn around, but for some reason I couldn’t remember how.

"I have it," panted a woman’s voice behind me. "Numbers. It’s only… He only has numbers."

"My lord," snarled a thick, deformed voice. "What is your command?"

"He doesn’t know where the Word is. He is useless to me. The book is in the right pocket of his coat. Take it, Xian. Then kill him."

Chapter Eighteen

I was pretty sure that Corpsetaker was talking about me, and I knew for sure that getting killed was a bad thing. I just couldn’t figure out how to go about doing something to stop it. Something about my mind. That it wasn’t working right.

A battered-looking man entered my field of view, and I was able to turn my head enough to watch him. Oh, crap, it was Li Xian, the ghoul. I had a bad feeling that he was going to do something unpleasant, but he just stuck his hand in my coat pocket and pulled out the slender copy of Erlking.

The ghoul turned away from me and offered the book to someone out of my field of view.

There was the sound of flipping pages. "Excellent," Corpsetaker said. "Take him back from the street and finish him. Hurry. He’s stronger than most. I’d rather not hold him all day."

Oh, right. Corpsetaker was holding my mind captive. That meant that she was in my head. That meant she had beaten my defenses down. Just pulling those thoughts together made me feel stronger. My head started clearing, and as it did the pain in my wounded leg grew more intense.

"Hurry," she said, her voice now strained.

Rough hands seized the back of my coat. I wanted to run, but I still couldn’t get everything to respond together. An inspiration seized me. If Corpsetaker was in my head, it meant that she could feel everything I was feeling-such as the burning pain in my leg.

When the ghoul started pulling me backward, I couldn’t struggle, but I managed to twist my hips a little and bend my good knee. I fell over sideways, onto the wounded leg. The fall drove the shuriken a little harder into my calf, and the world went white with pain.

Corpsetaker shrieked. I heard a metallic clatter, as if she had stumbled into a trash can, and I felt my arms and legs come all the way back under my command. The ghoul stumbled on his mangled leg. He pushed off the wall and came at me. I spun on the small of my back and kicked out hard and straight at his good knee.

That’s a nasty defensive technique Murphy taught me, and one that doesn’t rely upon raw physical power. The ghoul’s weight was all on that leg, and the kick connected hard. There was a grinding pop, and he let out a spitting snarl of pain.

I scrambled away from him on one leg and the heels of my hands. I could see my blood on the floor of the alley, smeared in a trail from my wounded leg. There were little stars fluttering through my vision, and I felt as weak as a starved kitten. Everything was spinning around so much that I didn’t even bother to get to my feet. I crawled out of the cold shadows of the alley, onto the sidewalk, and into broad daylight.

I heard someone shout something. There were police sirens a block or two away. They were doubtless heading for Bock’s place, after someone had seen me throw the ghoul out through the plywood-covered door. Give them two minutes to sort out what was going on, and I’d have men with silver shields and a strong desire to speak to the dead professor’s missing assistants all around me.

Of course, by then I’d probably have been dead for a minute and a half.

The wounded ghoul, his face twisted, jaws lolling open wide to show yellowed fangs, came shambling out of the alley after me.

I heard a woman shout, the sound high and furious and totally unafraid. There was a whooshing sound, a spinning shape, and then an ax- a freaking double-bladed ax-buried itself to the eye in the ghoul’s flank. Just as it hit, there was a flash of light from a spot on the blade, so bright that it left a red mark in the shape of a single rune burned into my vision. There was a loud bark of sound as the ax hit the ghoul. The creature was thrown forcefully to the sidewalk, and thin, greenish-brown fluid sprayed everywhere in a disgusting shower.

A woman in a dark business suit stepped into my line of sight. She was better than six feet tall, blond, and coldly beautiful. Her blue eyes burned with battle-lust and excitement as she drew a sword with a straight, three-foot blade from the scabbard at her side. As I watched, she took several smooth steps to place herself between the ghoul and me. Then she pointed the tip of the sword at him and snarled, "Avaunt, carrion."