Broken (Otherworld 6)

Yesterday Tee had chastised Jaime for not knowing how to call a zombie. At first, Jaime had chalked that up to Tee's madness--that she was confused and had forgotten it wasn't Jaime who'd raised the zombies. But the comment had gnawed at Jaime.

Zombies were ghosts inside dead bodies. If necromancers would summon ghosts, did it matter which plane--or form--they were in? While we'd been meeting with Tolliver and Shanahan, Jaime had been making calls, trying to track down instances of necromancers calling zombies they hadn't raised.

It had taken a lot of digging to come up with anything. Not surprising. If you can raise your own zombies, why steal someone else's? What she did find were a couple stories of incompetent necromancers who didn't have the skills to raise their own, trying to "buy" zombies--pay a better necro to raise them, then take them over. And it had worked...in a fashion.

In one story, the necromancer had been trying to recruit cheap farm labor. He'd hired someone else to raise a half-dozen zombies, successfully summoned them to his home and handed them their picks and shovels. And, industrious zombies that they were, they immediately set to work using those tools...to beat him to death. Then they went on a rampage of neighboring farms, leaving a swath of dead bodies as they tried to find the necro who'd raised them and could set them to rest. The second story was a variation on the first: yes, the summoning worked, but then you were left with the problem of controlling the zombies, which you apparently couldn't do if they weren't yours.

According to these stories, then, it was possible to summon another necro's zombies. And I wanted to believe it. We both did. But, like so many other stories passed down through the generations--like the one about the sorcerer's portal accidentally unleashing a demon or most of the stories in the Pack Legacy or even Jaime's Pet Sematary encounter--it smacked of didacticism. Humans tell fairy tales to warn children not to talk to strangers or wander into the dark woods. We impart our own story-lessons to our youth--the lesson being simple and universal: don't mess with forces you don't understand.

"Jaime?"

A muffled oath behind me. I backtracked to find Jaime kicking the wall.

"I--have--rat--shit--on--my--foot," she said, punctuating each word with a kick.

"Then wipe it off."

A scowl, as if I was being funny.

"Here," I said, trying not to growl. "Let me--"

"It's off."

"You're only going to step in more. This isn't a sandal-friendly excursion."

"It was these or heels. At least I can jog in these."

I strode down the hall, weaving around the patches of feces.

"Rat shit wipes off," I said. "Worry about the rats themselves. I don't smell any--they're probably out hunting--but be careful. Now, we were right over here...There. Clay put it up--"

I stared down at the empty ledge.

"It's gone. Goddamn it!" I felt along the ledge, though I could see well enough to know it wasn't there. "Who'd take a rotting finger?"

"Maybe it's the wrong ledge."

I bent to sniff the ledge. Yes, I could smell blood and rotting flesh. Even found a fleck of it on the wood. I scooped it up on the end of my finger. Too small for Jaime to use.

"Maybe a rat managed to knock it down and carry it off," Jaime said. "You said she was staying here, right? There has to be something else. Maybe a blanket she used, or a piece of her clothing."

"A piece of her would be better. If a rat got it, maybe I can track--"

As I dropped to an awkward crouch, I saw a spot of white in a small pile of debris below the ledge. I picked up two white bones, still connected by rotting cartilage.

"That was easy. Rat must have had to eat and run." I held it up. "Will this do?"

The woman who had been dodging piles of rat poop now reached for the bones as if I were offering her something as innocuous as a pen. She took the bones, rotting flesh and all, and turned it over in her hands.

"Perfect," she said.

When she called me over to say she was finished, I resisted the urge to shout "Did it work?" We'd been gone an hour. By now, unless something had happened with Clay's condition to distract Jeremy, he'd know I was gone. Then he'd find Jaime missing and figure out what had happened.

How long would it take him to realize that the best spot to find something belonging to the zombies was here? Where Rose had been living? Not long enough.

"She'll follow you, right?" I said, pacing the small room as Jaime packed her supplies. "We don't have to stay here."

"It'll be easiest for her if I'm close by, but we can move on."