Shadows of Asphodel (6 page)

She stared at her hands. They were all but invisible.

The rebels ran toward them, their boots kicking up bloody snow.

“Find them!” their captain shouted.

“Don’t let go,” Ardis whispered.

Wendel’s hand tightened on hers. “I won’t.”

Flashlights shone under the train, just to the right of their hiding place, then swept closer. Ardis climbed out on the other side and tugged Wendel after her. She ran along the side of the train and peeked between the cars.

A rebel stared in her direction. His gaze slid right over her.

Ardis raised her gun and shot him square in the chest. Before he even had time to fall, she was running again with Wendel at her side.

Four rebels left. Including the captain, if he wasn’t too wounded to fight.

“Slow down,” Wendel panted. “Too much noise.”

“A little late for that,” she said.

Ardis darted between the cars, found a rebel, and fired. But her pistol jammed. She tossed it aside and unsheathed Chun Yi. The rebel fired his rifle, missing wildly, and she dropped Wendel’s hand a split second before she attacked.

Shadows vanished from Ardis, and she saw the whites of the rebel’s eyes.

Then she drove Chun Yi into his heart and kicked the rifle from his hands. Wendel swooped in and, with a kind of macabre grace, touched the man as he died. The rebel never hit the ground, and he never breathed again.

Ardis saw the life flicker from the man’s eyes, replaced by the flat gleam of death.

“Attack them,” Wendel told his minion.

And the undead man did as he said. He advanced at a shambling run and turned on his former comrades. The captain hacked at him with his saber, but he was weak, and it took several swings before he felled the undead.

Three rebels left. And they had started to panic.

“Find the necromancer!”

“I don’t see him anywhere, Captain.”

“God, do you hear the crows?”

The whooshing of wings and caws foretold the arrival of the sleek black birds. A murder of crows perched in the trees. At their center stood the necromancer. He stepped forward, sheathed his dagger, and revealed himself.

The rebels crossed themselves and gibbered prayers. Their captain stared at Wendel, transfixed, like a mouse before a viper.

Ardis seized the moment by raising her bloody sword.

“Run,” she said in broken Romanian, “or we will kill you all.”

Standing beside her, Wendel spread his arms. “And I will bring you back.”

The rebels fled to their truck. They leapt inside the cab, gunned the engine, and roared off the railroad. Slush sprayed beneath the tires. The truck fishtailed and careened until it found the gravel road, then sped into the night.

Ardis looked to Wendel. “That worked.”

He smiled at her, and then she realized he was shaking.

“I was bluffing,” he said.

Wendel walked back to the train, slowly, his breathing harsh. Crows wheeled overhead, circling the necromancer. The sulfuric tang of gunpowder lingered in the air. Ardis wiped Chun Yi in the snow before she followed him.

“So many crows,” she said. “I wonder why.”

He looked sideways at her. “You haven’t heard the stories? Crows are an omen of evil. When you see them, death isn’t far behind.”

“I’m not from here,” she said, “remember?”

“The stories are true.”

“Necromancers are evil?” she deadpanned.

“Don’t you wish you knew?” He snorted. “The crows can sense my necromancy, and they know I leave bodies behind.”

She glanced at the fallen lying in the snow. “We should bury them.”

Wendel braced himself on the side of the train. He leaned his forehead against the cold steel of the train and let out a shuddering breath.

“Damn birds,” he said. “If it were up to me, I would choose a quieter omen.”

Ardis didn’t know how much strength he had lost by using his magic, but she knew it wasn’t a good idea to linger too long in the cold.

“Wendel,” she said.

“Give me a minute,” he said. “Let me catch my breath.”

There was the squeak of hinges and a metallic scraping. All the crows took flight and whirled overhead, cawing. A man walked onto the train platform. He scanned the surroundings, then looked down. His stare latched onto Wendel.

Konstantin.

The archmage stared at the necromancer, and their eyes met.

Any trace of pain or fatigue vanished from Wendel’s face, replaced by a look of pure disdain. He stood straight and dusted off his hands.

“Where were you, archmage?” he said. “Sleeping? Did you have sweet dreams?”

Konstantin’s shoulders tensed, and Ardis stepped between the two of them. She suspected things could get ugly fast if Wendel kept talking.

“Ardis,” the archmage said, “move away from that—that
necromancer
.”

He muttered the word as if it wasn’t meant for a lady to hear. But Ardis wasn’t a lady.

“He’s with me,” she said.

Konstantin thinned his lips.

“Last time I looked,” he said, “the archmages did not employ his kind as mercenaries. Necromancers are too… volatile.”

Ardis clenched her jaw. “He swore fealty to me, so I can’t get rid of him.”

“Get rid of me?” Wendel shot her a sideways glance. “How flattering. Though I do like the sound of ‘volatile,’ archmage. How about we—?”

“Wendel,” Ardis said. “Enough.”

The necromancer swept his arm into a parody of a bow and stepped back.

“I see.” Konstantin’s mouth thinned. “You trained him like an obedient dog.”

Wendel laughed, though it was entirely devoid of humor. “You should know. I have a feeling your mother was a real—”

“Wendel!” Ardis silenced him with a glare. “We’re not here to pick a fight. We barely got out of the last one alive.”

He shrugged. “The
guns
did add an element of challenge to the battle.”

Konstantin’s cheeks flushed slightly. “A minor imperfection in the Hex. A structural repair of the underlying magic shouldn’t take me more than an hour to implement. In fact, I should start work on that immediately.”

Ardis glanced at Wendel. “And the necromancer?”

Konstantin thinned his mouth. His jaw clenched and unclenched. He looked the necromancer up and down, then met his eyes.

“You belong to the Order of the Asphodel?” Konstantin said.

Wendel’s voice and face remained emotionless. “Yes.”

“They will be looking for you,” Konstantin said. “And I can do nothing to stop them.”

“True,” Wendel said.

“But you won’t turn him in?” Ardis said.

Konstantin shook his head. “Necromancy does not fall under the jurisdiction of the archmages. The Order will deal with him.”

“Excellent,” Wendel said. “Now that everything is settled…”

He climbed onto the train platform, shouldered past Konstantin, and opened the door.

“Where are you going?” Ardis called after him.

Wendel paused, then let the door swing shut behind him.

Ardis sighed, her breath a long plume of white, and clambered onto the train. Konstantin touched her arm to stop her and gave her a serious look, like people usually did when they thought she was being foolhardy.

“Do you know who he is?” he muttered.

“A necromancer,” she said, “from Prussian nobility.”

Konstantin’s eyes sharpened. “Which family?”

“I don’t know. He wouldn’t say.”

“Ardis.” Konstantin looked in her in the eye. “The archmages have heard rumors about a necromancer from Constantinople. One of the Order’s new favorite minions. A boy from a powerful family.”

“A boy?” She tilted her head. “He’s not a boy.”

He shook his head. “He’s younger than you might think. And they have been training him since he was no more than a child.”

They haven’t seen me since I was eleven years old
, Wendel had said.

“Do you know which family?” she said.

Konstantin shook his head. “The discovery of a necromancer would be kept as a closely guarded secret. Though there are those who suspect the defect originated among the nobles in the House of Hohenzollern.”

“Hohenzollern!” she said.

The same as Wilhelm II, the King of Prussia and the German Emperor.

I still managed to inherit bad blood
.

Ardis met Konstantin’s eyes. “What do you know about the Order of the Asphodel?”

The archmage shook his head. “An ancient society of assassins, with a particular interest in black magic. Officially, the archmages of Vienna have a truce with the Order, but that was signed over a century ago, and we unofficially do not approve of their actions. They tend to believe the end justifies the means.”

“One of these means being necromancy?” she said.

“Exactly.” Konstantin studied the lightening horizon. “Now if you will excuse me.”

She nodded curtly. “I’ll let you get to work.”

“Thank you,” he said.

Before she could leave, though, he held out his arm to halt her.

“And Ardis?” he said. “Don’t trust him.”

She looked into his eyes for a moment, but she didn’t know what to say. So she nodded and stood for a moment, watching the dawn. Railway employees had started hacking at the frozen earth to dig graves for the dead. One of the men covered their fallen conductor’s sightless eyes, but left the rebels to stare at the sky.

~

Wendel wasn’t in the cabin. After checking the dining car, Ardis ventured reluctantly into the lounge car. Judging by the forest green carpet, leather chairs, and lingering scent of cigars, the lounge was meant to be a bastion of masculinity. But this early in the morning, there were no gentlemen to request that she leave at once.

Discounting, of course, Wendel—though she wasn’t sure he was a gentleman.

The necromancer sprawled in a chair, a glass of green-gold liquid in his hand. He sipped his drink, then smiled languidly at Ardis.

“Please,” he said, “sit.”

She remained standing, and frowned.

“What are you drinking?” she said.

“Absinthe.”

“Why?”

Wendel lifted the bottle to his face to inspect its contents. The color of the liquor within resembled his eyes remarkably.

“You heard the medic,” he said. “Plenty of fluids.”

Ardis sighed. “Not
those
kind of fluids. Alcohol isn’t a good idea.”

“Why not?” He sipped his drink. “It helps to dull the pain.”

She reached across and took the bottle of absinthe from the side table, then helped herself to a glass. She kept the bottle. Clearly, he didn’t need any more. The absinthe scorched her throat, and she winced at the burn of alcohol.

“Not bad,” she rasped, and she swallowed a cough.

“Brave of you.” He dipped his head. “I never drink absinthe straight.”

She glanced at his glass, and realized his drink was indeed paler than her own.

“May I recommend a little sugar to cut the bitterness?” he said.

Blushing, Ardis spotted a bowl of sugar cubes on the table, alongside a carafe of ice water and a slotted silver spoon. She remembered there was a ritual for drinking absinthe properly, though she didn’t know how.

“To tell you the truth,” she said, “this is my first time.”

Wendel arched one eyebrow. “An absinthe virgin?”

She grimaced at his choice of words. “Not anymore.”

“You don’t drink much, do you?”

She shook her head. “I don’t drink fancy booze.”

“Booze.” He smirked. “Absinthe is too upper crust to be booze.”

Ardis smiled tightly. “And I suppose you know a lot about the upper crust?”

He shrugged and swirled the absinthe in his glass.

“Perhaps the House of Hohenzollern?” she said.

Wendel looked at her over his glass. “Who told you that? Konstantin?”

“He did,” she said. “Is he wrong?”

“No.”

She drank more absinthe, and rolled its fire on her tongue.

“Do you want to tell me more?” she said.

A strange look passed over Wendel’s face like a shadow. He set down his glass too hard, and it wobbled before he steadied it with a finger. He mustered something resembling a smile, but she saw the darkness in his eyes.

“What does Konstantin think he knows?” he said.

“He said the Order of the Asphodel has been training a necromancer since he was a boy. But he didn’t say much more than that.”

“The archmages really should hire better spies.”

“What kind of training?” she said, testing him.

Wendel’s false smile vanished. He looked out of the window at the sunrise creeping between the clouds and the fog.

“One more day,” he said, “until Vienna.”

“Do you have family in Vienna?” she said.

He knocked back the last of his absinthe. “No.”

She held out the bottle to him, but he ignored it.

“I don’t exist, Ardis,” he said. “Not to them. You won’t find me on any of their family trees. I’m not a part of their lineage anymore. If I die, they will have an easier time erasing me from their reputations. An easier time forgetting.”

Ardis was distantly aware of her heartbeat thumping, and of a tightness in her throat.

“When a necromancer dies,” she said, “does he die like a normal man?”