Spires of Infinity (6 page)

Leaning close enough over Gabriel that he could actually see her nipples beyond the low neckline of her shirt, Sam gave him a sleazy look. “Come on. It’s your duty to society to knock up as many girls as you can. You want to do your duty don’t you? If I were a guy with pure DNA that’s probably all I’d ever do. Perhaps my perception of men has been colored by the sorts I normally associate with, but isn’t the only thing most of you think about, day and night, stickin’ it to women?”

Gabriel noticed that her eyes were not the golden color of wolf eyes, but a more metallic gold. He raised his pistol and pressed it against the exposed flesh of her belly.

“Get out of my room please.”

“Or what? You’ll shoot me? Even a Lawman can’t get away with murdering an

innocent girl, even all the way out here on the border of the Red Zone.”

“I just might,” Gabriel growled. “I’ve had a very bad day and I don’t need this crap. Get out and leave me alone you crazy little nympho.”

“Fine,” Sam huffed. “I’ll be back in the morning with every woman in town to

gang rape you. Wait, you’re not gay are you?”

“God! I just want some damned sleep! Why can’t you just go away and leave me alone!”

“Because men like you are few and far between,” Sam retorted. “You know how

long I’ve been waiting? Four years! Stop being selfish. I just want a little of your white goo. It’s not like I’m asking you to cut off your arm. It was my impression that most men disposed of perfectly good semen two or three times a day, if you know what I mean.”

Winking, she made the jerking off motion with her hand again.

Gabriel pulled back the hammer on the pistol. “Get away from me.”

“Have it your way.” Walking to the window, Sam opened it and leaned out.

“Hey everyone! There’s a guy in here with—“

Rushing to the window, Gabriel pulled her away from it, slamming it shut.

“
Don’t
do that!”

The cat on Sam’s shoulders stood up and stretched. Moving to her right shoulder, it raised its head to her ear. She nodded as if it was talking to her.

“You’re not from around here, are you,” she asked.

“No,” Gabriel answered.

“Where do you come from?”

“Chicago.”

“I never heard of that place,” Sam muttered. “It must be really far away. Maybe so far away that the radiation is low enough people don’t mutate and drift. Maybe you just don’t know what it’s like here. Look mister Lawman. I wanna have a baby. I really, really,
really
, wanna have a baby. It could be years or even decades before another man as pure as you comes along. I’ll have to settle for someone of a lower grade and who knows what sorta defects my baby might have. I don’t know what it’s like where you come from, but here you’d be lucky to see one in ten years as pure as you. Please. Do you want me to beg?”

“Please don’t. I just want to
sleep
!”

“What do you want for it? I’ve got money. I’ve got a great body, see?” She

turned so he could see her figure at all angles. “All yours if you want it. I’m willing to do anything. Are you going somewhere? I could be your guide. I know the entire Empire like the back of my hand.”

Gabriel wasn’t aware that he’d given anything away, but Sam flashed him a

knowing smile. “That’s it. You don’t know where you’re going. I could lead you there.

It won’t cost you a single thing except a little semen.”

The cat put its mouth to her ear again and she nodded twice.

“I’ll even pay your room and board along the way,” Sam said. “So, what do you say? Is it a deal? Where are we headed?”

Gabriel thought about it for a second, trying unsuccessfully to eye her figure up and down without her noticing. She caught him looking, winked, and grinned at him.

She was rather attractive, despite her apparent youth. Of course he was
totally
going over that ID of hers with a high powered microscope to make sure she wasn’t jailbait before anything like Mayo went anywhere near anyone’s taco. Did accepting make him a manwhore? It seemed a reasonable deal, especially if she was perfectly willing to take the leavings of a solo session.

“I’m headed to the Spires of Infinity.”

The cat reared back and hissed loudly, and Sam took a startled step back.

“Why would you wanna go to a place like that, mister? It’s next to the

Quarantine Zone. The radiation is still very bad out there and there’s every kind of mutant between here and there, not to mention the fact that the Children of the Chosen have declared war on
anyone
passing through their territory. And the Spires are haunted.

Everyone knows that!”

“Lovely,” Gabriel muttered. “That’s where I have to go.”

“It’s very risky,” the cat said in a deep, male voice.

Gabriel was so startled that his knees gave out and he fell back onto the bed.

“That—that’s a talking cat.”

“Oh very observant,” the cat replied, sounding bored. It had an accent like a dried up, snobby, British art critic. It clapped its forepaws together. “Bravo. Do any other tricks?”

“Mister Mittens,” Sam cut in. “That was
not
very nice. He hasn’t agreed yet! Be more polite until the dealing is over please, then you can rip on him all you like.”

“That’s a talking cat,” Gabriel repeated.

“He’s a mutant,” Sam explained. “What is it, ninety-three times more intelligent than the average housecat?”

The cat—Mister Mittens—nodded smugly.

“He’s my boss,” Sam explained. “He’s very rich. He paid for my NVM in return for ten years of being his hands, with, of course, the option to renew my contract afterward. See, I have a great job and can easily provide for a child.”

“Rather hard to pick things up when you have no thumbs,” the cat explained.

“That’s a talking cat,” Gabriel repeated again.

“I think you broke him,” Sam told the cat.

Gabriel shook his head and tore his eyes away from the cat.

“You can take me to the Spires of Infinity?”

“I know generally where to find them,” Sam shrugged. “Not exactly. Not many

have been out that way in the last century or two. That was ground zero in the Great War. The radiation can still be dangerous even if you’ve been immunized. What do you wanna go all the way out there for anyway?”

“Because I have to.”

“Fine, keep it to yourself. Look, if we go out there you may not be ninety-eight percent pure when we come back again.”

Gabriel sighed.

“Then I guess we don’t have a deal after all.”

“Whoa,” Sam waved her hands. “Hold on. No one said that. I’m just saying it’s really nasty out there. How about you pay me first and then I take you out?”

“You want to go out into that mess pregnant,” the cat asked. “I wouldn’t advise it, Sam.”

“Oh, yeah, that wouldn’t work out too well, would it,” Sam sighed. “Fine. Okay.

Here’s the deal. I take you out to the Spires of Infinity, pay your room and board, and when we get back I get what I want. Deal? I only know the general area to find the Spires, but there will be other towns along the way, and I hear there’s some big military thing going on near the Quarantine Zone too. Won’t be too hard to get directions along the way. And there’s the NVM town of New Hope, it’s supposed to be close enough to see the Spires, and I bet everyone knows where that is. Unless, maybe, there’s something else you’d take as payment?”

Gabriel sighed. He supposed he could have worse girls after him, the innkeeper for example. Still, it was just so twisted! “Deal, I guess.”

“Great,” Sam cried, rushing to hug him tightly. “Oh, thank you so much! Hey, I don’t even know your name.”

“Gabriel Reeve,” he replied when she finally released him. “I’m a lawyer.”

“Is that what they call Lawmen in that Chicago place?”

“Not exactly. I represent criminals to make sure that their rights to a fair trial are upheld.”

“Oh,” Sam said with a disgusted sniff. “One of
those
.”

“Now, could you leave me be and let me sleep,” Gabriel asked.

“Oh no you don’t! I’m not falling for that one. You’ll slip out the second I’m gone and run yourself right outta town. I’m not letting you outta my sight until we’re well on our way.”

Gabriel gave an annoyed shake of his head. “Fine! But I paid for it so I’m taking the bed!”

“How very chivalrous of you,” Mister Mittens said dryly.

As Gabriel lay down on the bed, Sam turned off the light. Then she plopped

down on the bed next to him, pressing her body against his. She felt feverishly hot, and as much as he hated to admit it, after the biting cold all day long, her warmth was very welcome.

“What are you doing,” he asked.

“It’s big enough to share,” Sam replied. “And you looked cold. You’re lucky I’m not a whore, or you might wake up with a bill in the morning. Just so you know, I
do
bite, so hands off the valuables unless you plan to make a purchase.”

“I’ve met some crazy women in my time,” Gabriel muttered, “but you win the

prize.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment. Good night, Lawman.”

Trying not to think about what part of her body was touching him where, Gabriel was lulled by her warmth and was soon fast asleep. He would have objected to sharing the bed, but he just couldn’t make himself give up the heat that her body was radiating into him. He’d been with many women in his time, but just by laying next to him, Sam seemed closer than any of them had ever gotten before. It reminded him of his childhood when his mother used to hold him after his father finished beating them both bloody. He hadn’t felt that sort of comfort in over twenty years, and he’d missed it dearly.

Chapter 6: Old Gods

The wind was warm, and it felt wonderful blowing through Kari’s hair.

Grounding her bowstave in the dirt, she closed her eyes and let it pass over her. Taking a deep breath of the clean air, she could hardly believe that she was on a completely different world than the one she’d been born on.

“Well that’s disappointing,” Jonathan sighed. “What sort of adventures are we gonna find in the middle of some farmer’s fields?”

Kari kicked him in the shin on general principle.

“Look at
that
,” Michael said in awe, pointing and massaging his leg. The twins sometimes complained that they could feel each other’s pain, which was just plain silly.

Kari and Jonathan both turned to look. Expansive golden fields of grain, divided into squares by roads, spread to the horizon in every direction. There were no mountains or hills. Standing in the middle of the flat fields was a single visible building that was so tall Kari could not even see the top of it. The massive, metallic gray shaft stretched for the pinkish sky and beyond, glittering in the sunlight.

“Oh
wow
,” Jonathan said.

“That thing is
huge
,” Kari agreed. “Someone must
really
be compensating for something. I bet we could see the entire world from the top of that tower.”

“I think we just found our first adventure,” Jonathan grinned broadly.

“Oh, I was hoping you’d say that,” Michael nodded eagerly.

“Let’s go,” Kari agreed. “We can’t pass up visiting a tower that huge. But first, Heretics might not be very welcome in this world.”

Piercing her thumb on one of her fangs, Kari quickly drew a symbol in blood on the palm of her hand before the puncture healed over. Hemomancy called upon the power in the blood of a Heretic, the power that made them something more, and at the same time, something less than human. That power could be used to do just about anything from creating illusions, to healing wounds, to calling down the most destructive forces of nature, so long as she knew the symbols of the Demon language to describe what she wanted the power to do. And, of course, she needed a great deal of willpower to control it, else it could rage out of control and burn her to a cinder. Once completed the symbol began to glow with a dark light, and Kari could feel the power calling out to her, waiting to be used. Exerting her will upon it, she forced it to take the form that she wished. The air around her and her brothers blurred and within seconds all traces of their animal traits were hidden away by an illusion. They looked like three human travelers.

“Handy trick,” Jonathan said as Kari pulled out a handkerchief and began wiping the blood away.

“I have to say that I’m at least twelve percent less handsome now,” Michael

sighed.

“You two look just like father,” Kari giggled. “Grow some stubble and you’ll be mirror images.”

“
Stubble
,” Michael cried with mock indignity. “And cover up this beautiful countenance?”

“Pfft, I’m prettier,” Jonathan snorted.

“You’re identical, you idiots,” Kari muttered.

“That’s what she thinks,” Michael said.

“Indeed.”

“Should we show her where we’re
not
identical?”

“Don’t you dare,” Kari glared at them, imagining a hundred different things that she
really
didn’t want to see from her brothers.

“I don’t wanna get kicked again. Maybe some other time.”

“Let’s go,” Kari interrupted. “That tower looks close, but it could be a lot farther away that it appears.”

“Hey look,” Michael said, pointing in the opposite direction. “A wagon.”

“Please god,” Jonathan said to the sky, “pretty farm girls for all.”

Kari rolled her eyes in disgust.

“And I
suppose
a pretty farm boy for Kari,” he added, jumping back so he couldn’t be kicked.

Trundling along, pulled by a donkey that had probably been old at the time of

creation, the wagon was wide enough to take up the whole narrow, hard-packed, dirt road.

Pulling to a halt alongside them, the driver, nearly as ancient as his donkey, eyed them critically. His wide brimmed, straw hat did not quite hide his wild white hair, and his worker’s clothes were worn and dusty. Tipping his hat to Kari, he nodded amiably to the twins.

“Morning,” he said. “You young’uns heard the words of Cain yet?”