Dead Beat

"Here’s the plan. We get to the Beetle. We drive away."

"And then what? Where do we go after that?" he asked.

"You don’t see me nitpicking your plans, do you?"

There was a sudden, heavy thump against the steel security door. It rattled in its frame. Bits of dust descended from my ceiling. Then another. And another. Grevane had thrown enough zombies at the wards to wear them out.

Thomas grimaced and looked at my leg. "Can you get up the stairs on your own?"

"I’ll make it," I said.

Butters came panting up the stepladder from the lab, his face pale. He wore my nylon pack, and I could see Bob the skull making one side of it bulge a little.

"Gun," I said to Thomas, and he handed me the shotgun. "Right. Here’s how it works. We open the door." I gestured with the shotgun. "I sweep it clear enough to get Thomas clear of the doorway. Then Thomas goes in front. Butters, I’m going to hand you the shotgun."

"I don’t like guns," Butters said.

"You don’t have to like it," I said. "You just have to carry it. With my leg hurt, I can’t get up the stairs without using my staff."

The steel door rattled again, the pace of the blows against it increasing.

"Butters," I snapped. "Butters, you’ve got to take the gun when I hand it to you and follow Thomas. All right?"

"Yeah," he said.

"Once we get up the stairs, Thomas runs interference while I start the car. Butters, you’ll get in the backseat. Thomas gets in and then we leave."

"Um," Butters said, "Grevane trashed my car so I couldn’t get away, remember? What if he’s done the same thing to yours?"

I stared at Butters for a second and tried not to show him how much that worried me.

"Butters," Thomas said quietly, "if we stay here we’re going to die."

"But if they’ve destroyed the car-" Butters began.

"We’ll die," Thomas said. "But we don’t have a choice. Whether or not they’ve destroyed it, our only chance of getting out of this alive is to get to the Beetle and hope it runs."

The little guy got even paler, and then abruptly doubled over and staggered over to the wall beneath one of my high windows. He threw up. He straightened after a minute and leaned back against the wall, shaking. "I hate this," he whispered, and wiped his mouth. "I hate this. I want to go home. I want to wake up."

"Get it together, Butters," I said, my voice tight. "This isn’t helping."

He let out a wild laugh. "Nothing I can do would help, Harry."

"Butters, you’ve got to calm down."

"Calm down?" He waved a shaking hand at the door. "They’re going to kill us. Just like Phil. They’re going to kill us and we’re going to die. You, me, Thomas. We’re all going to die."

I forgot my bad leg for a second, crossed the room to Butters, and seized him by the front of his shirt. I hauled up until his heels lifted off of the floor. "Listen to me," I snarled. "We are not going to die."

Butters stared up at me, pale, his eyes terrified. "We’re not?"

"No. And do you know why?"

He shook his head.

"Because Thomas is too pretty to die. And because I’m too stubborn to die." I hauled on the shirt even harder. "And most of all because tomorrow is Oktoberfest, Butters, and polka will never die."

He blinked.

"Polka will never die!" I shouted at him. "Say it!"

He swallowed. "Polka will never die?"

"Again!"

"P- p-polka will never die," he stammered.

I shook him a little. "Louder!"

"Polka will never die!" he shrieked.

"We’re going to make it!" I shouted.

"Polka will never die!" Butters screamed.

"I can’t believe I’m hearing this," Thomas muttered.

I shot my half brother a warning look, released Butters, and said, "Get ready to open the door."

Then the window just over Butters’s head exploded into shards of broken glass. I felt a hot, stinging sensation on my nose. I stumbled, my wounded leg gave out, and I fell.

Butters shrieked.

I looked up in time to see dead grey fingers clutching the little guy by the hair. They hauled him off of his feet, and two more zombie hands latched onto him and pulled him up through the broken window and out of the apartment. It happened so fast, before I could get my good leg under me, before Thomas could draw his saber.

There was a terrified scream from outside. It ended abruptly.

"Oh, God," I whispered. "Butters."

Chapter Twenty-three

I stood staring up at the broken window in stunned silence for a second. "Harry," Thomas said, quiet urgency in his voice, "we need to go."

"No," I said. "I’m not leaving him."

"He’s probably dead already."

"If he is," I said. "It won’t protect him from Grevane. I won’t leave him there."

"Do we have a chance in a fight?"

I shook my head with a grimace. "Help me up."

He did. I limped over to the window and shouted, "Grevane!"

"Good evening," Grevane said, the rich, cultured tones of his voice a marked contrast to the dull, steady pounding at my front door. "My compliments to your contractor. That door is really quite sturdy."

"I like my privacy," I called back. "Is the mortician alive?"

"That’s a somewhat fluid term in my experience," Grevane said. "But he is well enough for the time being."

My knees wobbled a little in relief. Good. If Butters was still all right, I had to keep Grevane talking. Barely five minutes had passed since the attack began. Even if the bad guys had cut the phone lines to the whole boardinghouse, the neighbors would have heard the racket and watched the light show from my wards. Someone was sure to call the authorities. If I could keep Grevane busy long enough, they would arrive, and I was willing to bet money that Grevane would rabbit rather than take chances this close to his goal. "You’ve got him. I want him."

"As do I," Grevane said. "I presume he found the information in the smuggler’s corpse."

"Yes," I said.

"And I take it you also know."

"Yes."

He made a thoughtful sound. He was very near the broken window, though I couldn’t see him. "That presents a problem for me," Grevane said. "I have no intention of sharing the Word with anyone. I’m afraid it will be necessary for me to silence you."