Free Demon Games [4] by Steve Feasey

attack would ultimately lead to your death.’ She studied him for a moment from beneath her brow. ‘But you are already dead. You have been dead for over two hundred years. When your brother ended your human life and made you into a vampire by giving you his infected blood, you died. Have you forgotten that?’
    ‘Of course not. I merely meant—’
    ‘Your choice of words is interesting,’ she said, interrupting him. ‘As are your recent experiences.’ She paused again. ‘Who performed the ritual with the Globe to bring you back?’
    ‘Alexa.’
    ‘Ah yes, the dhampir daughter. She is becoming quite a sorceress, I understand.’
    Lucien ignored the insult. A dhampir was indeed the child of a vampire father and human mother, but the term was only ever used in a derogatory way here in the Netherworld. Hag was a powerful sorceress, and like all of her kind she hated the idea that another practitioner of magic might be moving up the ranks, acquiring skills and knowledge she herself might not have, or might wish to keep secret. Fights and squabbles would often break out over these things, and Lucien didn’t doubt that Hag might perceive Alexa as a threat. He waited for the old woman to go on.
    ‘It’s hardly surprising. She is a child conceived entirely through magic. Who would have thought that her mother possessed the power to reanimate that part of your anatomy for long enough to make such a thing possible?’ Hag cackled again, ignoring the look Lucien gave her.
    ‘She has clearly inherited all Gwendolin’s skill –’ the sorceress batted at a fat black fly that bothered the air in front of her – ‘and would seem to be even more powerful, if she has managed to perform what you have just described.’
    ‘And that is?’
    ‘To give you rebirth, Lucien. To bring the undead back from the dead.’ She stopped, looking across at him in a strange way. ‘You are unique, vampire. You have died twice, once as a human and now as a vampire, and yet here you are.’
    ‘That cannot be,’ Lucien said, shaking his head.
    ‘I try not to be concerned with what others tell me can and cannot be,’ she said, waving her hand dismissively in his direction in the same way she had at the fly. ‘What has become of the Globe now?’
    ‘It is useless. The magic that it contained seems to have gone. It is little more than a pretty black paperweight now.’
    ‘Shame,’ the old woman said with a shake of her head. ‘It was a much treasured artefact. But then Gwendolin always was very careless about the way she looked after – and protected – such things. Its disappearance explains a number of things.’
    ‘And what might they be?’
    ‘The Globe was made to heal sick nether-creatures. Sick – but living – nether-creatures. It was used by the demon lords to cure their armies, and it was coveted by all. As—’
    ‘I didn’t come here for a lecture on the history of—’
    ‘Be quiet, vampire,’ Hag hissed. ‘And you might learn something for once. Your spies here in the Netherworld do not know everything, oh no.’
    Lucien bowed his head. ‘I’m sorry.’
    ‘As you know,’ the sorceress continued, ‘if the Globe was used in conjunction with another ancient artefact – Skaleb’s Staff– it had another use: to bring the dead back to life. That is why Caliban sought it out and gave it to Gwendolin: to raise an army for him. A zombie army.’ A strange smile played at her lips. ‘He still aims to create such a thing.’ She paused, staring at him. ‘Many of the denizens of the Netherworld loathe the humans. They, like Caliban, would be happy to see the human race subjugated, but their numbers are too small for such a thing. The nether-creatures have never been large in number, and over the centuries war and infighting have thinned their ranks even more. If Caliban were to seriously try to attack the humans, he would need to enlist an army of some kind. Zombies are ideal for his needs. There is never a