Summoned to Rule Page 3

  “You don’t order me around anymore,” I said over my shoulder.

  “That was a request,” she called after me. “A humble pretty-please. I’m not that fit.”

  I smiled but hid it from her. She was getting better at getting through to me and it was strange; I had never spent much time around my masters, and never around former masters. Having someone know me as well as she did was a unique experience.

  I stopped and sat on a rock. She slowed down to a jog and when she reached me she collapsed beside me.

  “I need to catch my breath,” she said. She spent a minute breathing heavily and I wondered what would happen if she had a heart attack out on the blasted plains, far away from medical attention.

  “I don’t want to lead them,” I said when it became obvious she wasn’t going to start.

  “I don’t think they want you to lead them.”

  “I’ll leave, then, and everyone can be happy.” I didn’t bother getting up; there would be more to her argument and I would just have to sit down again.

  “Nobody is happy, Agmundr,” she said. She mopped sweat from her brow and looked up at me. “But sometimes we do things we don’t like. It’s one of those human things you don’t understand all that well.”

  “You don’t understand it either,” I said. Bec didn’t have emotions, as far as I could tell. She’d once considered having me kill Roman, our only ally in a fight with a host of angels, because he did something we didn’t like. I still didn’t know why she decided to spare him.

  “Sure, I’m a little dead inside, but I can tell when some things need to happen, and this needs to happen. You know, he didn’t have to give you a choice.”

  “So because he could have ordered me to do it and didn’t, I should do it because he asks nicely? I should behave as though he was a master because he chose not to be one?”

  “Exactly,” she said, answering my rhetorical questions honestly. Bec was weird.

  “He didn’t summon me because he knew I’d spend the next few days trying to kill him for it, because that’s what I do.”

  “No, actually. He didn’t want to be your master. He wanted to be your friend, and have you as a leader.”

  “Angels can’t summon me anyway,” I said. I didn’t know if that was true, but it probably was.

  “He didn’t know that, either. He wanted me to summon you because he figured we’ve already done that dance and you’d be fine with it. When I said no he came up another option.”

  I looked back at the small community; the demon was still staring in our direction and I wondered if he could hear what we were talking about. Probably, I decided, but I didn’t care.

  “It doesn’t change anything,” I said at last.

  “Of course it does. Don’t be an idiot. He could have made you do this, or he thinks he could have, and he didn’t. That makes him a good guy and that makes you an asshole for not helping him.”

  “I don’t want to lead them.”

  “And they don’t want you to lead them,” she repeated. “It’s a match made in heaven.”

  She gestured to the heaven around us as though to underscore her point.

  I had led people before, into war and out of it. I had been the king of the lands of my birth and sat beside a god-queen, dispensing justice and taking tribute. I had been a conqueror and a rebel, and I had no interest in reliving any of it.

  “Why do you care?” I said.

  “Because I want you to come back, and this is something you’ll regret doing as soon as they make a mistake. You’ll end up having to fight them, or you’ll run away from them, but either way you won’t be back in the city for long.”

  “No,” I said. I made sure she was paying attention, locking eyes with her and waiting a moment. “That’s why you think it would be a good idea. Why do you care?”

  She shrugged, a typical Bec answer to things. “There’s a gang calling itself Chaos and they’re making a mess in the city. We think they’ve recruited some of the critters crawling out of the gate, though they may not know it.”

  “And you want me to stop them?”

  “I do. I still have to live in that city, no matter what happens out here in this charming little heaven.”

  Her “critters” were either lost souls, angels, or demons. Lost souls in fresh new bodies would be troubling, but if an angel or a demon decided to join a gang it would change the dynamics of the city completely. I still wasn’t sure I cared.

  “Are the vampires playing nice?” I had brokered peace between the new vampire king and the rebels who didn’t like him that much. If Bec wasn’t bringing them up they were probably doing fine, but I was interested.

  “They’re…not killing each other,” she said. “I wouldn’t say they’re friends, but they aren’t threatening me or chasing each other through the streets. There are worse outcomes.”

  “Then get them to help,” I said. “They have more of a stake in the welfare of Fairbridge than I do.”

  “Sure, because they can stand up to the things you smack around on the regular.”

  “I have to go back to Erindis, anyway. I can’t stay here and deal with all this.”

  Erindis had some of the blood of the elder-god Ohm, which made her a serious threat if she wanted to be one. And I got the feeling she wanted to be. She was my wife and my responsibility; if I was going to focus on anything it had to be her.

  “She’ll come find you,” Bec said. “She needs you, right? So she’ll turn up here and you’ll face her. And you’ll have the backing of all the people here, if you help them.”

  Dammit, I thought. She’d finally come up with a good point.

  “You have your father’s money now?” I asked. If it were anyone else I would have known to tread carefully around the topic of her father’s death, but with Bec I could be blunt.

  “Sure.”

  “Then leave. Take a holiday to a beach somewhere and watch the waves. You don’t need to stay here any more than I do.”

  “Do I look like someone who would enjoy sitting on a beach and watching cute surfers all day?” She looked away. “Actually, now that you mention it…”

  I smiled, then realized she’d made me smile when I was supposed to be frustrated and angry.

  “So,” I said. “Given that you can leave whenever you want and you don’t care about any of this, really, why are you hounding me to stay?”

  She looked into my eyes again and I got a bad feeling. Something about her demeanor had changed and it made me uneasy.

  “I missed you,” she said. “I missed the hijinks.”

  “No you didn’t.” Hearing the words come out of her mouth was odd, like she’d suddenly started speaking dolphin. “You don’t miss things. You don’t pine after things.”

  She put her hand on mine. “I missed you.”

  I waited for her to force a smile, or pretend to laugh, but she was being serious. Which meant she was either under a spell or she was trying to manipulate me. There was no other explanation for what she was implying.

  I stood and started walking away. If she was going to behave the way she was then I felt no further obligation to listen to her.

  She didn’t follow me and I was left with the silence of the plain. I had been mistaken in my assessment of the heaven before; there was life to be found, though it was tiny and scuttled between pebbles. I tried to focus on the small sounds and not on the woman waiting behind me.

  Bec didn’t feel things, so she was clearly just using every trick in her arsenal to convince me to stay. She hadn’t missed me, and she certainly hadn’t missed me in the way her look and her touch on my hand implied. That wasn’t how her mind worked.

  Or was it? She was strange but she was still human. Psychotic dictators had wives they cared about, didn’t they? They didn’t know how to deal with them, but they cared.

  She was a puzzle and I hated puzzles. She was also a former master I’d once sworn to kill, so having her behave the way she did was even strange
r.

  She had a good point, though. I had to concede that having help when Erindis caught up to me would be useful. She had an army of super soldiers and the power of an elder god. I had myself and a body covered in tattoos that didn’t do anything most of the time. Any help I could get would give me more of an edge than I would have otherwise. Any help would give me an edge, period.

  I stopped and shook my head. I was actually considering it, I realized. I was thinking about leading them. Not about the thing Bec was suggesting. Just leading them.

  I groaned and turned back. Bec was still waiting for me, still sitting on the rock. She smiled and it made me smile, even if she was just faking it.

  Dammit. I’d just finished with someone who wanted to use me. I didn’t need another one messing with my head.

  Chapter 6

  She led the way back into the main building of the settlement. The crowd parted before us and she stopped at the edge of the open center. Buddy and Peter were yelling at each other.

  “If you had your way we’d be sitting here forever,” Peter said.

  “Rather sit here than attack innocent people,” Buddy replied.

  I got the feeling this was what their meetings always devolved into. They had fundamentally different world-views and nothing was going to change that. Not even me, if they accepted me as their leader.

  “We have the right,” Peter said. He leaned across the driftwood table, as though proximity would make his point for him.

  “You believe your strength gives you the right,” Buddy replied, leaning in as well. Their faces were inches apart, screwed up in anger. There was a good chance they were about to start fighting, and I didn’t give Buddy much of a chance of winning the fight.

  “You two should calm down,” I said. If they had been men I would have made a lewd comment about how close they were getting to each other, but they were angels and wouldn’t know what I was talking about.

  These were the sorts of differences to commanding non-humans I was going to have to keep in mind. My life was strange.

  “Your lapdog has returned,” Peter said, stepping back and sneering at me.

  “He isn’t—” Buddy began, but I didn’t need his help.

  “You can shut your mouth,” I said to Peter. He was a warrior angel, a firebrand; I figured he’d respond to strength more than logic.

  “I am free to say whatever I want, outsider.” He crossed his arms and puffed out his chest, for all the world like the bully in a schoolyard.

  “I am the leader here now,” I said. He began to object but I spoke over him, using the tattoos to amplify my voice. “You will speak when I say you can speak, angel. You will be happy when I allow you to give me advice. Do you understand?”

  He shook his head. “What I understand is that Buddy has your leash. I understand that—”

  “I just told you to shut up,” I said, cutting him off before he could launch into his speech. “I don’t want to help you people.”

  I looked around the room at the assembled crowd, making sure to take my time and to give Peter a chance to interrupt if he was going to. He didn’t.

  “I want to go home and deal with my own problems, which I assure you are worse than this constant squabbling. You people are children, or your leaders are. I’m going to ask you to vote again, and I want you to really think about the outcome you’re looking for. Do you want these two, who can’t just shut up and get something done, or do you want me? I can’t guarantee you a place on earth, but I can guarantee you that if there’s a place for you I’ll get you there faster than your current representatives.”

  There was murmuring around the room and I waited until it was done. Peter was furious and Buddy looked hurt, but at least they were being quiet. There were worse outcomes. Bloodier outcomes.

  When the crowd had settled down I continued.

  “I have made a place for myself in the world you want to live in. I have spent time with the people you will need on your side if you make the move. I know the players and I know the game.”

  “You would have us be slaves,” Peter said. He stopped talking when my eyes snapped to focus on him. I raised the glow on the tattoos as well, which probably had something to do with it.

  “I don’t care about you, angel. Go, see if you can take the city. Know this, though: whether the people gathered here vote for me or not, I live there now. You can try and take it from me but I guarantee I will tear your head from your body and piss in the neck hole.”

  “You can’t…” He couldn’t finish the sentence. I suspect because he wasn’t sure if I was serious or not.

  “Now, the lot of you, vote.”

  They took longer this time, with Peter calling for his side first and waiting for hands to go up. He seethed in silence as most of his former supporters refrained from voting. I was getting tired of the looks he kept shooting my way, but I understood where he was coming from.

  Buddy eventually called for his side and every other hand went up.

  “You’ll regret this,” Peter said, though his voice was lower than before. He wasn’t playing to the crowd now; he was talking to me.

  “Are you going to be a problem, angel?” I said. If I had to kill him I preferred to do it during the meeting, rather than after he had a chance to betray me.

  He started to reply, then stopped. Started again, then stopped. He wanted to scream at me, to fight with me, perhaps to start throwing punches. But he was outnumbered and he didn’t know what I would do. He was loud and opinionated – and he wanted to enslave a bunch of humans – but he wasn’t stupid.

  “If you’re done?” I said. I let him stand in silence for a few more seconds, just to make the point. “Good. Now I have a favor to ask all of you. Don’t do anything stupid. Don’t do anything you haven’t been told to do. Don’t make me have to punish you. I have no interest in being that person. Understand?”

  There was general murmuring around the room again as heads nodded in agreement. Peter just kept staring and I matched his gaze.

  “When you are all in place and this is done, I might ask you for help. I have a problem coming, a big one that risks everybody, and I might need some assistance. If I do what you ask of me and find you a place, then I trust I can call on you in my hour of need?”

  General nodding again. Only the imp and the warrior angel remained still.

  “Fine, then I need everyone on a register of some kind. I need to know what I’m dealing with and what requirements will need to be met. I will also need you to come forward to Buddy if you know of anyone who has already gone through the gate and might be a problem on the other side. Is everyone clear?”

  Nobody objected so I moved on. I had applied the stick, been the harsh leader; now it was time to soften things a little.

  “I also want to say that I understand your frustration. I have spent most of my life as an outsider and I know what it means to find a place you might be able to call home. I feel the same way, which is why I don’t want things to go wrong for you. A bad result for you is a bad result for me too. Trust me until you no longer can, and then we’ll talk. But know this: above all else, I am interested in the general wellbeing. I want this process to succeed, more than anything.”

  The lost souls in the crowd clapped but the angels and demons did not. It was a good result, and one I could build on in the coming days.

  “I have to get started in the city now,” I said. “Buddy, Peter, imp-thing, I need to see you in private. I’ll see everyone else when I’ve got some news.”

  I turned and walked out, trusting they would follow me. It was a stupid power play, forcing them to decide if they wanted to disobey me already, but it worked more than it didn’t. I’d turned generals around with simpler moves.

  I led them to an adjacent shack. I didn’t know what it was used for normally but it was empty and I needed a place. Bec had followed the others and she waited by the door.

  I turned to Peter first.

  “Are you going to be
a problem? I want you to tell me if you are, so we can get this out of the way now.”

  He was still furious and I could see he wanted to let go, wanted to scream in my face. He didn’t, which I thought was a good sign, though he might have been saving it for his eventual betrayal.

  “I’ll follow you,” he said at last. “But if you don’t do what you say you will then we’ll be having this conversation again.”

  “That’s fair. Buddy, do you have anything you want to add to the meeting? Anything you didn’t feel you could say in front of everyone?”

  Buddy shook his head. He seemed content to let me do what I thought I had to. Or he was waiting to catch me when we were alone. Either way, I was sure I could trust him.

  “What do I call you?” I asked the imp. As a proxy of the demon outside I wasn’t sure if he had a name himself, but I wasn’t really talking to him anyway.

  “My name is not pronounceable,” the imp thing said. It sounded like it was gargling rocks. “You can call me whatever you like.”

  “Then Imp-thing it is. Are you going to be a problem?”

  “I spoke up for you.”

  “Sure, but that might have been to gain some political points. I want to know if I have to worry about you doing what your kind are known for. I want to know you’re not going distract people from the work.”

  “I am eager to get started,” he said. Hearing complete sentences from the creature was strange and something I’d have to get used to. Either that or I’d have to start speaking directly to the demon.

  “Alright. I want you all to help out with the registration. I need to know what kinds of bodies are required. There are billions of people, so there are plenty of dead ones to choose from. I just need to know what not to do.”

  “I want to come with you,” Peter said. “To earth. I have been there before, obviously, and I think I can be helpful to you.”

  He was a hollow man, so he had some understanding of Fairbridge. It wasn’t a bad idea, but I didn’t trust him yet. I shook my head.

  “Not yet. I need to set some things up and you’ll be a distraction. Stay here and make sure everyone is doing what I asked.”