Dead Beat

"Kemmler’s disciples," she said. Her eyes were deeper than the lake she stood upon. "Could it be?"

"Could what be?" I asked.

"The Word," she said. "The Word of Kemmler. Has it been found?"

"Um," I said. "Sort of."

Her delicate white brows rose. "Meaning what, pray tell?"

"Meaning that the book was found," I said. "By a local thief. He tried to sell it to a man named Grevane."

"Kemmler’s first student," Mab said. "Did he acquire the book?"

"No," I said. "The thief used mortal technology to conceal the book, in order to prevent Grevane from taking it from him without paying."

"Grevane killed him," Mab guessed.

"And how."

"This mortal ferromancy-technology, you called it. Does it yet conceal the book?"

"Yeah."

"Grevane yet seeks it?"

"Yeah. Him and at least two more. Cowl and the Corpsetaker."

Mab lifted a pale hand and tapped a finger to rich, lovely lips the color of frozen mulberries. Her nails were colored with shining opalescence gorgeous to the eye and distracting as hell. I felt a little dizzy until I forced myself not to look at them. "Dangerous," she mused. "You have fallen among deadly company, mortal. Even the Council fears them."

"You don’t say."

Mab narrowed her eyes, and a little smile graced her lips. "Impudent," she said. "It’s sweet on you."

"Gosh, that’s flattering," I said. "But you haven’t told me a thing about why they might be interested in the Erlking."

Mab pursed her lips. "The being you ask me about is to goblins as I am to the Sidhe. A ruler. A master of their kind. Devious, cunning, strong, and swift. He wields dominion over the spirits of fallen hunters."

I frowned. "What kind of spirits?"

"The spirits of those who hunt," Mab said. "The energy of the hunt. Of excitement, hunger, bloodlust. Betimes, the Erlking will call those spirits into the form of the great black hounds, and ride the winds and forests as the Wild Hunt. He carries great power with him as he does. Power that calls to the remnants of hunters now passed on from mortal life."

"You’re talking about ghosts," I said. "The spirit of hunters."

"Indeed," Mab said. "Shades that lay in quiet rest, beyond the beck of the mortal pale, will rise up to the night and the stars at the sound of his horn, and join the Hunt."

"Powerful shades," I said quietly.

"Specters most potent," Mab said, nodding, her eyes bright and almost merry as they watched me.

I leaned on my staff, trying to get as much weight as I could off of my injured leg, so that it would stop pounding enough to make me think. "So a gaggle of wizards whose stock in trade is enslaving the dead to their will is interested in a being whose presence calls up powerful spirits they couldn’t otherwise reach." I followed the chain of logic from there. "There’s something in the book that tells them how to get his attention."

"Darling child," Mab said. "So clever for one so young."

"So what is it?" I asked. "Which part of the book?"

"Your godmother," she said, her smile growing wider, "has no idea."

I ground my teeth together. "But you do?"

"I am the Queen of Air and Darkness, wizard. There is little I do not."

"Will you tell me?"

She touched the tip of her tongue to her lips, as if savoring the taste of the words. "You should know us better than that by now, wizard. Nothing given by one of the Sidhe comes without a price."

My foot hurt. I had to hop a little bit on my good leg when my balance wavered. "Great," I muttered. "What is it you want?"

"You," Mab said, folding her hands primly in front of her. "My offer of Knighthood yet stands open to you."

"What’s wrong with the new guy?" I asked, "that you’d dump him for me?"

Mab showed me her teeth again. "I have not yet replaced my current Knight, treacher though he is," she purred.

"He’s still alive?" I asked.

"I suppose," Mab said. "Though he very much wishes that he were not. I have taken the time to explain to him at length the error of his ways."

Torture. She’d been torturing him in vengeance for his treachery for more than three years.

I felt a little sick to my stomach.

"If you like, you might consider it an act of mercy," she said. "Accept my offer, and I will forgive your debt to me and answer all your questions freely."

I shuddered. Mab’s last Knight had been an abusive, psychotic, drug-addicted, murdering ra**st. I was never clear on whether he got the job because of those qualities or whether they had been instilled in him on the job. Either way, the title of Winter Knight was a permanent gig. If I accepted Mab’s offer, I’d be doing it for life-though there would, of course, be no promises as to how long that life would be.

"I told you once before," I said, "that I’m not interested."

"Things have changed, wizard," Mab said. "You know the kind of power you face in Kemmler’s heirs. As the Winter Knight, you would have strength far outweighing even your own considerable gifts. You would have the wherewithal to face your foes, rather than slinking through the night gathering up whispers to use against them."

"No." I paused and then said, "And no means no."

Mab shrugged one shoulder, a liquid motion that drew my eyes toward the curves of her br**sts within the silken gown. "You disappoint me, child. But I can wait. I can wait until the sun burns cold."

Thunder rumbled over the lake. Off in the southwest, lightning leapt from cloud to cloud.

Mab turned her head to watch. "Interesting."

"Uh. What’s interesting?"

"Powers at work, preparing the way."

"What is that supposed to mean?" I asked.

"That you have little time," Mab said. She turned to face me again. "I must do what I might to preserve your life. Know this, mortal: Should Kemmler’s heirs acquire the knowledge bound within the Word, they will be in a position to gather up such power as the world has not seen in many thousands of years."

"What? How?"

"Kemmler was"-Mab’s eyes grew distant, as if in memory- "a madman. A monster. But brilliant. He learned how to bind to his will not only dead flesh, but shades-to rend them asunder and devour them to feed his own power. It was the secret of the strength that allowed him to defy all the White Council together."