“I have a right to exist,” Gary demurred. “Which means I have to feed.”
Aye, and you’ve done well.The Druid’s head slumped against his chest.Maybe too well. Did you have to be so vicious with the wee bairns?
Gary could only shrug. “You said yourself that we’re evil, and that we need to act like it. I was just following my orders.” Gary squatted down and studied the map. There were plenty of survivors left-hundreds. He could keep this up for months and not run out of food. Any compassion or sympathy he might have once had for the living was draining out of him, perhaps as a result of being shot at every time he met them or maybe he really was becoming the creature of absolutes Mael had asked him to be. “This is what I am, right? A monster. Don’t criticize me for being good at it.”
Mael studied him for a long moment before agreeing.Aye. Forgive an old wizard for his sentimental maundering. I’ve another task for you, lad, one I imagine you’ll take to. It’s a big job and it’ll take a thoughtful man to pull it off.
Gary nodded. He was ready, whatever it might be. Mael had promised him that he would feel at peace once he had accepted the role fate had cast him for and as usual the Druid was right. He felt strong, so much stronger than when he had crawled out of the basement of the Virgin megastore with a hole in his head. Even stronger than when he’d first awoken in a bathtub full of ice.
A dead woman in a stained pair of jeans and a low-cut halter top that showed off her withered blue breasts stumbled forward, nearly stepping on the map. She would have been pretty, once, a Latina with a massive mane of curling hair. Now her face showed blossoming sores and clouded eyes. She looked at Gary and then at Mael and finally let her gaze drift out of focus. Not particularly strange behavior for a walking corpse but to Gary she seemed more dazed than she should be. As if she’d been drugged or put into a trance.
You’ll need more than your usual retinue for this job. You need to learn to read theeididh, and how to lead troops into battle. This one has knowledge I want to impart in her head, if you can get to it.
Gary licked his lips, more than a little excited. Mael had powers beyond his own, far beyond, but so far the Druid had been stingy with teaching his attack dog any new tricks. “How do I…” he asked, but he knew what the answer would be.
Open yourself, as I’ve told you before.
Gary nodded and reached out to grab the dead woman by the back of the neck. He tried to do what he’d done before-stroking the network of death, just as he had when he took control of his companions, just as when he had summoned the crowd that devoured the survivor Paul. He pushed until his brain was throbbing and white daggers of light leaked in around the corners of his vision but only succeeded in gaining her attention. She stared at him wide-eyed, as if fascinated by the dead veins in his cheeks.
You can do better than that, man,Mael mocked.It’s not something you see or hear or taste-forget those things and try again!
A little annoyed Gary tried again-and only managed to develop a buzzing in his ears. He could feel the dead blood quivering in his head and he thought for sure he would give himself an aneurysm but then, finally, something snapped and roiling shadows blossomed in his mind, streaks of darkness, of dark death energy that resolved into rays, into threads. Strands of a web that linked him to everyone around him-the dead woman, Mael, the seers hanging from the walls. He could sense Faceless and Noseless behind him.
Then he saw the back of his own head.