All That Lives Must Die

League of Immortals.

But could someone, just once, want him for his own sparkling self?

This was the problem with being a narcissist: No one appreciated you as much as you knew you deserved.

“How can I be of service today?” Louis asked.

“This Board’s previous efforts position the children on a knife’s edge,” Mephistopheles said from his shadows, and his hand chopped down onto the table for emphasis. “Half Immortal, half Infernal. We must bring them into our jurisdiction.”

“Temptations backfired on us,” Lev said. “Those chocolates, the Valley of the New Year. Who knew the kids could use them to their advantage so quickly?”

“I believe,” Abby interrupted, “that Sealiah’s seductress-this new Jezebel-had some success?”

Sealiah betrayed no emotion on her beautiful features. A sign of deception, to be certain.

“Jezebel’s real influence has yet to be seen,” she said.

“And Beelzebub’s attempt to force a solution,” Ashmed continued, “proved disastrous.”

Indeed. Louis had been there when his darling Fiona had parted the head of the Lord of All That Flies from his body.

“We need a new deception to bring them into the family,” Abby said. “And since your blood runs through their veins, Louis, we had hoped you had a suggestion.”

There it was, the one shred of truth in this maneuvering: They needed him.

The universe spun around Louis. He, who was a second ago more common than dirt, was suddenly the golden key to the ambitions of the Infernal clans. This was his chance, but to do what? Place his only two children in danger to gain advantage and power? And land. . one could not forget the land to be gained.

But Eliot was so talented, playing his Lady Dawn.

And Fiona was so beautiful and so strong, and she didn’t even know it.

Poisonous fatherly concern coursed through his veins and muddled his thinking.

This weakness-the vestiges of Louis’s human form, no doubt-would destroy him if he allowed such a cancerous influence to run its full course.

Thankfully, rational thinking prevailed.

Louis was many things, perhaps even a father to his children, but he had never been a fool in the face of opportunity.

“Yes,” Louis replied to the Board, “I know how this might be accomplished.”

The shadow form of Mephistopheles chuckled, and the subsonic noise made Louis’s teeth rattle.

“Doubt if you will,” Louis said, “but I know their weakness: They have been brought up to be ‘good’ children.”

They stared at him, rapt. Louis had them now.

“A good little boy and girl, with all the ingredients that lead to moral downfall, including the most important: good intentions.”

Ashmed nodded, picked up his cigar, and puffed, greatly pleased with this.

“Go on,” Abby said, her eyes sparkling.

“We require a theater of Shakespearean proportions to draw the twins closer. . as they have proved themselves highly susceptible to familial drama.”

“Shakes-whos-its?” Lev asked. “You lost me.”

“Shakespeare: the basis for all those Mexican soap operas you so love, Cousin,” Louis explained.

“How, specifically, would one engineer this ‘drama’?” Sealiah asked.

“We shall do what we do best,” Louis said, and spread his arms wide. He congratulated himself on a smooth transition to using we to refer to himself and the Board as partners on this venture. “We shall do it by fighting amongst ourselves. A war, just a little one, should do the trick.”

Of course, he was telling them all this because wars had their winners and losers. . and where there were losers, there would be pieces of land and power for Louis to scavenge.

Ashmed’s dark gaze was light-years distant. “A sanctioned Civil War could destroy many clans,” he said. “Are these two children worth that?”

“It need not be a full Civil War,” Sealiah said. “Two clans would suffice. Something intimate. With only two involved, the loss to us would be trivial-negligible after we reabsorb the power base of the loser. Naturally, the specifics of how to draw Eliot and Fiona into the conflict would be left up to the individuals with the most at stake.”

Despite this coming from Sealiah, Louis liked the addendum to his plan. With only two factions involved, he would not have to personally risk doing any of the dirty work.

“The destruction, however, of even a single clan,” Ashmed reminded them, “is still a considerable tactical liability, since we are on the eve of war with the Immortals.”

Lev laughed. “Terrible for the loser. Which wouldn’t be me. Sign me up.”

“I, too, want the chance to play,” Abby whispered. “It has been too long since we had such sport. I volunteer my clan to go to war.” Her hand clutched her pet locust, and it squealed.

“As do I,” Sealiah stated.

Mephistopheles hammered a fist upon the railing, and the entire table jumped. “Fools-we all want blood on our hands. I propose we dispense with the usual discussion and move directly either to violence or dice to settle this.”

“Excellent motion,” Ashmed said. “Do we have a second?”

Louis took a step back from the table, feeling gravity condense about the Board members. He weighed who would fight whom. . and who would survive. Lev was powerful but slow. Abby was unstoppable but gullible. Sealiah was ever full of tricks. Ashmed, he had never seen fight. And Mephistopheles? Perhaps the most dangerous here, with his pitchfork of shadow smoke.

With one wrong twitch, Louis could be caught in the middle of the mayhem.

“I will second the motion,” Sealiah breathed, “for dice.”

Louis exhaled.

Sealiah rubbed her palms, and a die appeared: a Naga of Dharma.

The last few times Louis had seen one of the legendary dice, they had decided Charlemagne would become Emperor, that they’d test-fire Mount Krakatoa in the fifth, sixth, and seventeenth centuries, and that some utterly forgettable film would win the Academy Award.

It was a cube of scrimshawed ivory carved from the spine of the world serpent. Only five such dice existed. On the faces were etched six crows, five hands (each making its own rude gesture), four stars, three crossed swords, two prancing dogs, and a single head-eating-tail asp.

Ashmed called for a vote.

Ashmed raised his hand-as did Sealiah and, curiously, even Mephistopheles. Abby and Lev did not.

This shocked Louis. Usually there was at least a minor brawl and a few broken bones on the Board to settle even trivial matters. The civilized approach left him with an uneasy feeling.

“Dice it is,” Ashmed announced. “For such a weighty decision, I will require a broader probability distribution.”

From his pocket, he produced a second of the remarkable Nagas. Sealiah graciously let him borrow her die.

“Highest and lowest numbers shall have sanction to wage open war,” Ashmed explained. “The victor shall have all the usual rights of spoils.”

“Fine,” Lev grumbled. “Just let me roll those bones.”

Ashmed raised an eyebrow at his impudence. The Chairman rolled first, the dice tumbling onto the table. They came to rest neatly on the pass line. A five and a four-hands touching stars-nine total.

Lev scooped up the dice, scowled, shook them violently, and threw.

The dice cracked together like a billiard break-bounced against the far bumpers, and rolled back in front of him. Four and three-seven: dead center in the probability distribution. The worst possible roll.

Lev’s giant hands clenched about the table’s railing and crushed it. He swallowed his rage, muttering.