Chapter 12
Ash, the Crazy Stupid Drunk, Part II
Ash don’t know how long he stood there. Heart pounding frozen acid in his ears.
The street between the stone buildings suddenly seemed too narrow. Too small for the giant bucks taking up most of the space. Their giant sharp hooves planted on the cobble. Steaming breath coiling out of their mouths and snouts. Huge sharp antlers down and ready to charge. Waiting for the pale ghouls marching underneath them to clear way.
Amber grinned her wide cherry vanilla smirk.
Her scent, mingled with his utter bitter raw fear, now as bittersweet as the thought that he would at least die by her hands.
But the chocolate scent she definitely gave her monster deer warmed his blood a bit. The sight of her peachy body built finer than any bottle of wine in Chemarin. A sight he had only believed, deep down, he would never get to see again.
To see her divine plump chest fruit and lush sleek hips in tight translucent silk straps?
Definitely 100% Amber. In a sexy femme fatale supermonster role.
Especially after she just turned a bunch of ghouls – basically the lowest class of dread not much better than rotting lumbering zombies.
Except they can regenerate.
And obey orders somewhat coherently.
Far more like the dangerous undead beings called revenants. More powerful if raised skillfully enough.
No.
Thinking dreads capable carrying out their own plans. Like slowing down as they marched under the buck’s long bodies and legs. Who then prevented Ash and his temporary lycan allies from attacking the dreads.
So they could further drench us their terrifying-inflicting presence.
Yet dreads served and obeyed their master, utterly, loyally. Their old selves were only partly intact. Just enough to aid them in their goals and missions.
Aid them in the total destruction of the living too.
Their very presence inflicted an innate, paralyzing fear on the living.
Except vandread’s.
Being both living and undead turned that paralyzing fear into a mere annoying worry, supposedly. Her superior acting skills hid any innate worry. Even that electric blue right eye gleamed wicked and confident.
“Good one,” Ash rasped. The words forced out of his jaw. The touch of chocolate in the air saving him.
Let him push his body into a crouch.
Even if it was harder than breaking a thick fresh oak branch.
“But not good enough,” he said.
Lifting his foot was like lifting a boulder., lifting an anchor that dragged it slower and slower.
Planting it down was louder than Penny’s worst stomping temper tantrums.
Then he jerked his elbow down.
Cracking his blade up. Pointed toward Amber.
Then threw her another roguish smile.
Because finding Amber alive, even as a vandread darkling, was better than Ash had hoped. Enough to warm his blood a bit. That sexy outfit, so unpractical yet so theatrical, definitely was all her. Snake bone wings too.
“Not bad for a femme fatale darkling, Ambie Bambie,” he said, “You’ve got the evil look and the evil nature down pat. Style too. I love how you don’t overdo the ugly stuff. Monster bucks as ugly as a hog’s dirty rear. Dreads as creepy as a peeping tom school. All I’ve got are two lousy lycan too scared to throw an insult, let alone a slash.”
The renewed mew and growl of the lycan behind Ash definitely weren't entirely directed at Amber anymore. The cricks of their paw feet against the cobble probably came from their crouching even deeper.
Yet a practical vandread would of slaughtered his wise-cracking ass long before he opened his mouth.
Well, actually, as soon as she confirmed his identity.
Probably.
But Amber?
She let out a wicked cackle. Hefty enough to jiggle her goods too. The echo snapped throughout the cramped stone street.
Warming his heart with prickles.
So what if he did end up dying here? His true love lived a happy life once more. Evil or not, a second life was still a life. She didn’t exactly have a choice in the matter either. A vandread only got so much room to negotiate their three conditions too. Necromancy, as the Earth Wizard called it, wasn’t always exactly fair toward the dead trapped in its spells.
But her conditions, though, let her live and serve her clustershit of a master happily as her dramatical nutty self.
Not some mindless bloodthirsty brute.
Since, well, just because her monster bucks were snorting and snarling at him, they did smell amazingly like sweet tasty chocolate.
Not that rotten decaying stink most evil things went with.
Far better than most darklings. They probably had stinking contests rather than drinking contests.
“Poor Ashtray,” she said, “Afraid I can’t help you this time. Be a man and save yourself.”
Then pursed her lips for a long-distance cherry tart kiss.
“I’m sure you can do it,” she added, “But those lycan –”
Bolts of blue lightning flew past Ash from behind. Missing his arms by mere inches.
And struck both monster bucks.
Engulfing each of them in a net of forking blue electric.
Their screams cracked the air. Their hooves smashed the ground.
Shook and jerked their massive bodies. Snapped their long legs. Their fur raging and whipping about.
Yet the electric nets held them.
Charging the air with the same bitterness of sparks that two blades smashing together sometimes made.
But far stronger.
Yet not as strong as the buck's fur suddenly snatching the dreads underneath the giant undead beasts.
The dreads tried to dart. To escape.
The fur was faster.
Wrapping around their undead, struggling bodies. Cracking their bones and skin. Sliding through their flesh despite it trying to regenerate from the damage.
Their screeches ignored.
Dragging them through the electric net. Even if it sliced through their bodies.
Sucking them into a raging ocean of fur.
The crunches and scrapping echoing sharp. Right through the narrow roads as the screams of the bucks.
Yet Amber merely arched her nectarine eyebrow in surprise. Her right eye sharper than before.
And focused on the lycan behind me.
“Snow now!” shouted Mandy.
Yet barely loud enough to hear over the screams of monstrous deer.
The electric nets suddenly vanished. Only the bitter stink of sparks left behind.
And the furious bucks pounded the cobble. Antlers down. Snorts full of steam.
Their eyes spearing the lycan.
“Hey, dinner steaks!” shouted Mandy.
Then chucked a tall angular glass bottle of clear bubbling liquid right at each buck’s forehead.
Flying right across their eyes like a blindfold. Smashing apart. Splashing their eyes thoroughly with the contents.
Their screams made their prior screams sound like whispers.
His back suddenly had a familiar squirming feel. Because those bottles looked disturbingly like the vodka called Dying Man’s Run – a vodka a bit less potent than Dead Man’s Run.
Especially the bubbling clear liquid part.
And the bucks were now convulsing on their hooves too.
No.
He drank Dying Man’s Run more often than Dead Man’s Run to reduce the intensity of his hangovers the next day. No way something he put inside himself on a regular basis could cripple a pair giant wyrming undead monsters.
The next bolts of blue lightning ripped through the bucks. Quickly shredding them into little piles of ash scattered across the cobble.
Amber’s smug smile no longer showed her vanillas.
* * *
“I actually drank that stuff last time I was alive,” Amber said. Her snake bone wings sinking to the ground. Flat and sloppy.
Her tone somewhere between amused and annoyed at herself.
As if her failed chocolate-smelling monstrosities never existed. The piles of ashes scattered across the cobble as worthless as that deaf singer long ago who had no talent and no will to improve.
Let alone improvise.
Forget the dreads and their short cannon folder roles. On stage – whether on the nice hardwood platforms in vast room of rows of raised pine chairs or the crude plank platforms built the same day as the performance in a park – those dreads would of been forgotten quickly.
Talent took risks, as Amber loved to say.
Well, before she was a vandread.
Hopefully now too.
Her eye looked right at Ash. But not at him.
Passed him.
“You were always quicker than me,” he said, “I’m still at denial. That stuff wasn’t Dying Man’s …”
But those loose straps hanging off her waist and wrists … they seemed frozen in a wind that never existed.
Till the waist ones shot at him.
Passed him. One on each side.
Stretching but not thinning.
Gasps then chokes.
Fabric scrapping against fur.
Tightening.
Then an explosion.
The heat searing his back with icy dry chills.
The red sultry straps jerked back to Amber. Her pouty lips hooked in a gawk.
Apparently, this was one explosion she didn’t cause.
“So you’re the one hunting down the wizards,” Snow said.
But her voice was far more confident. More lyrical too.
“And pinning it on your dead sister,” Amber said, “Don’t leave that part out.”
“You clawing bitch!” exclaimed Snow. “The Fire Wizard wanted to teach her magic! He even bought her freedom!”
“Boo hoo,” Amber said, “No one bought me freedom from you lycan. Well, besides the grim reap. But he’s not exactly the one you want buying it. Even if he’s a decent guy and all. Just saying.”
“Mandy!” Snow exclaimed, “That’s enough proof, right? Free me so I can –”
“No Snow,” hissed Mandy, “I only promised to help you clear your name. Not to free you the instant I did.”
“But …” began Snow. Her tone clearly recognizing the futility of the argument before she began it.
So Ash broke in.
Because if the Fire Wizard was anything like his dad, the Earth Wizard, then Scarlet was probably not such a bad lycan after all. Snow neither.
And maybe not Mandy.
Too much.
In fact, sparing his life the moment he sputtered out the surname La Pushka, well … not many human attackers would even humor this kind of nonsense. Forgot most darklings like spidora and ratlings and worse.
Not that he wouldn’t win this contest. No question about that.
But when enforced by magic for life, unconditional servitude had one advantage.
The right order should basically be able to neutralize it. Give her real freedom.
Even if technically, her oath still bound her,
“Wait,” he said. Too conscience that both lycan still stood close behind him. To his sides. “Mandy, Snow’s your friend, right? Don’t tell me your holding her because of our purren challenge. Let her go and … um …”
“No, Ash,” said Mandy, “A purren oath is still an oath. I expect –”
“Hey, you idiots,” said Amber. Waving her regenerated red straps around. “Powerful bloodthirsty undead darkling here. Remember? Ash for all times sake, I’ll cut the chase because you're too dense to ever see it. Mandy’s got tail twitch for you. Snow too, I bet, since lycan ladies prefer to date guys many to one. So –”
“Wait,” Ash said, “What?”
The several feet of empty cobble between him and Amber seemed far more vast than before.
“Hey!” shouted Mandy, “It’s just not honorable to kill a purren challenger, even when the challenge is as stupid as a drinking contest, unless the rules –”
“Oh, shut it, catgirl,” said Amber, “You like him or else you’d of sliced his throat long before he pulled the purren card on you. And with Snow and her magic –”
“I would never cheat a purren challenger,” said Snow, “We lycan do have honor. Even if most of us are bloodthirsty idiots. And we’re not much better when drunk.”
“Then show me some of that bloodlust,” said Amber.
Her sultry red straps now paired with arms to hips.
Then attacked the lycan.
* * *
The four red straps speared toward his sides.
Toward Mandy and Snow.
The several feet of cobble between Amber and Ash far too small now. The lampposts not bright enough. The stone walls looming too high. Their paintings too dull, as if their fruity colors were drained dry of their sweet cheerful touch.
Amber's straps stretching wiz, their near silent breeze, punched the night.
The now suddenly silent night.
The smell of roasted cherries and vanilla hit him. Her beloved scent. Far stronger than usual, of course, since a girl like her knew to wear it more subtly. But the whole undead thing, better safe than stinky.
And stark reminder what fate Amber might suffer if she lost to Snow.
Enough to make Ash glance down. Search for any other bottles of liquor. Pray that Mandy took more than two from the caffe. Especially since she to put some down before, it sounded like, at least.
And he did find two bottles.
Both knocked down, but both laid near him. One tall glass of bubbling clear liquid was a few inches from his heel. Another Dying Man’s Run. The second bottle, a tall pitch maroon bottle with an extra narrow waist in the middle – right next to his toes.
Inside that bottle was it. That special red wine spiced with the mintiest of mints.
The Red Organism.
Its very existence spiked his heart with that warm bite that only the best red wines could manage.
But a giant burst of deep blue and violet flames roared from his other side.
Yanked his attention back to Amber. Her gleeful grimace glinted from the flames. Flames that heated his side as much as the lustful memories best not remembered right now.
From Snow’s electric whatever added plenty of crackles.
Rips and tears from Mandy’s claws.
Yet no straps attacked Ash.
Yet.
Now a normal hero like Felix the War God would announce a brave speech about how far his dear Amber had fallen to such deplorable depths. That he would free her from this terrible existence even if it cost him his life.
But Ash wasn't normal.
And definitely not a hero.
Especially since she got the jump on the obligatory speech before the final fight too.
“Now it’s time to show me what you learned while I was away in heaven,” Amber said.
Then cocked her head to the side. Jutted those lush hips out. Elbows in. Palms up.
Wiggling her fingers up at the sky.
“Okay, okay, it was hell,” she said.
Licked her cherry lips nice and slow. As if tasting their juicy sweetness and savoring it.
“But hell’s more fun,” she said, “Really. Scary but fun.”
Part of Ash actually wanted to ask, “Really? Hell?”
It wasn’t like she was a good-hearted virtuous lass led astray in her last life. Her stuck-up bitchy persona did have a real-life component to it. Including being nasty, sadistic, and all together unpleasant when the time called for it … and sometimes when it didn’t.
But so what?
She was more honest than most people he knew. Less bloodthirsty too. Even as her current vandread state proved. Since other vandread would of wiped all of them out and reduced them to a bloody stain long ago.
So what if everyone back then said her some of her bloodier plays indicted a sick, twisted mind? Better a play with fake bloodshed than the real stuff. How many of those same people hesitated when it came to public stoning criminals, no stopping despite pleas of mercy, screams of agony from broken bones and gashes? When it came to pounding out their frustrations on those sentenced to the stocks for a bit?
Two activities Amber only watched on occasional, never actually participated in, tossing a play or two out there to try to gain sympathy for the ones convicted of sillier, harmless crimes like starving artists selling pornography to feed his family or some convicted as accomplices to coordinated thieving for merely feeding urchins some handouts out of sympathy.
The very same anti-heroes that few audiences sympathized with and often ended up jeering against anyway.
So they were very definitely wrong.
“Sounds great,” Ash said, “Any pointers when I get there?”
Because if Amber ended up in hell, no way he wasn’t either.
These two lycan too. How much innocent blood did they shed? No way they stood a chance, if Amber didn't.
Though judging from the sounds of their battle, they stood a better chance of doing well.
But yeah. As if he stood a chance against Amber’s sexy straps of doom. Magical lycan lightning barely held its own.
Anyway, darklings had to go to hell, didn’t they?
Useful info here, furballs.
“Sure,” said Amber, “Try not to mess up too badly when you get there. It’s a demon eat demon world. And word to the wise, avoid becoming a demon’s pet. It’s a lot like being a wyrm buddy … but only the demon gets privileges – including ordering your cute ass around whenever it wants.”
“Ouch, I’ll remember that one,” he said, “Anything else?”
Well, besides the glares from the lycan spearing his back. Because fighting a deathmatch usually involved, you know, actually fighting. Wars and raids too. In fact, combat in general, With swords and fists and arrows and so on. Kill or be killed, or severely wounded, or captured, and so on.
But Amber and Ash liked to do things differently.
Funner that way.
Of course, there’s no way he could explain to these lycan's uncultured minds the intricacies of this normal, unpractical, but common theatrical technique against an overwhelming powerful enemy that he was using against Amber.
Especially the point that she knows exactly what he was doing too.
Or thought so.
“Yup,” said Amber.
Perked out her plump chest fruit. Just to lure his wandering eyes back at her.
“Pretty talk goes pretty far down there,” she said, “Smooth talking too. Just be sure to back it up when push comes to stab.”
“No wonder you got yourself a second life and a sexier body under such good terms,” he said, “I bow to the master of –”
“Hey!” shouted Amber. Wrinkling her cutesy nose. “No calling me master. My master will punish me – no, torture me, if I cross that line. Understand?”
“Oops,” he said.
Bowing his head to his waist anyway.
Then glanced sideways unseen to look for the two bottles Mandy had put down.
“Sorry there, m’lady,” he said.
Hearing that groan under her huff … he didn’t need to see her frown to know he was pushing a bit too far.
Better do this quick.
So he snatched the bottles. Both with his free hand. The minty red wine dubbed the Red Organism and the bubbly clear liquor aptly named Dying Man’s Run up.
A skill perfected through much practice.
“Don’t want to ruin your life – second life,” he said, “A toast to your wonderful second life. Because what’s the point of a second life if you don’t have fun with it? Then we can get down to business … eventually.”
Her wicked smirk melted into a cheerful smile. Her eye sparkling with an electric more powerful that the magical lycan’s … electric frigid bolt attack thingy.
The crackles of lightning even fiercer. Mandy mews louder too. With her rips and shreds.
He had a feeling Mandy was really regretting accepting a purren challenge from him.
But Amber simply flicked the right side of her hair. Then slid her fingers gracefully down to her ear.
“You always knew the right thing to say,” she said, “Sometimes.”
He couldn’t help but blink at the strange confession. Very out of role too.
“Okay,” she said, rolling her eye, “Rarely. But better than never.”
“To better than never!” he said.
Popped the bottles’ corks with his saber’s hilt.
Amber sighed. Closing her eye and shaking her lowered head.
How she could maintain a full sultry strap assault on two lycan, one very magical, yet barely pay attention – okay, seemingly not pay attention at all – no way any of the living here stood a real chance if she decided to get serious about killing any of them.
Mandy and Snow would only delay the inevitable.
Unless this plan worked.
So he walked the most dangerous few steps of his life.