Death by Cliché (14 page)

“Puissant is a funny word. I think I’ll use it in this chapter.”

—Bob Defendi

raldolf stared at the ceiling, his eyes wide, his mind
empty.

Hraldolf wasn’t just an evil man, he was a man of the world. He conquered nations, he ruled, he collected fine art, and he made love to beautiful women. It was what an evil overlord did. It was in the job description and everything.

He rolled over in the tremendous feather mattress, cozy under a great weight of furs, and looked at the woman sleeping next to him. She was beautiful. All his maids had to be beautiful, but there was something different about her, a glow of reflected light, the faint hint of movement as she breathed.

He found a magnificent comfort here, a warmth, but more than that. The feeling of another body, a woman’s body, under the covers with him: it had a sensation all its own. A strange confluence of the flesh, the heart and, dear gods, the soul.

Hraldolf stared at the ceiling. If he kept thinking like that, he’d lose all his evil overlord cred.

No, he had to stay strong. He had to keep pushing ahead. The second Artifact, the destruction of the world, these were the things that meant something, not the affection of some nameless maid. Maids were nameless for a reason. It made it easier to call them things like “Honey” and “Sweet Cakes” and “Boom Boom.” One didn’t talk to a maid unless it was to tell her to take her clothes off. One certainly didn’t
care
for a maid. They didn’t have feelings. They were moving furniture.

And yet, he wanted to take her in his arms and squeeze her. He wanted that so badly it made his heart hurt.

No, there was something deeper here, something stranger. He avoided the main issue like he avoided adventurers and vengeful peasant children and the occasional old woman. Old women gave him the heeby jeebies. Maybe because his grandmother used to play with him using a cheese grater and ten yards of black nylon cord.

But he avoided the issue again. The real issue was he’d just had sex.

He’d had sex almost every night of his life since he’d become the evil overlord. Evil had its privileges. The problem was this was the first time he
remembered
having sex. He could remember the before and the after of every other sex act he’d ever performed, but this was different. This time he could remember the
during
.

It was like—and he couldn’t understand this—he’d just lost his virginity.

But that was crazy. He’d lost his virginity at the age of thirteen. With his father’s girlfriend, but that was beside the point.

The point was he couldn’t remember that either.

And so he had to fight all these strange emotions as if he’d never experienced a woman before. Even though he
knew
that wasn’t the case.

He didn’t know the reason, couldn’t even guess the reason. There was no way for him to know this was because he was becoming real, feeling things for himself for the first time. He didn’t know
Carl
was a virgin, and that was why this was the first time he felt like he’d had sex. This was the first time he’d
had
sex.

Really.

And… uh…
puissant
.

Chapter
Twenty-Four

“Good Morning Starshine.”

—Bob Defendi
(Not singing, as that would be a violation of US Copyright Law.)

here are clichés, and there are .

comforts. The father going nuts over your little league game is a cliché. The father holding you when you are hurt and crying is a comfort. The snotty cheerleader is a cliché. The snotty cheerleader floundering in math class while you get every answer correct is a comfort. Let’s face it. We’re people, not saints.

So, while it is a cliché that adventurers hang out in taverns, actually hanging out in a tavern is a comfort.

It was a mid-sized village, like a Viennese mountain town with large Tudor houses, roads that climbed and twisted through the buildings and the smell of hickory smoke.

A two-wheeled hay cart blocked the road in front of them as a fat man with a leather apron beat a donkey with a whip. The donkey seemed more concerned with showing the man the power of a disobedient labor force than the whip itself. Damico expected a bunch of strike breakers wearing pinstriped suits and spats to appear wielding clubs.

Evidently Jimmy Hoffa had reincarnated as an ass.

They squeezed by the donkey and down the street, up a steep, cobbled alley with hay and rushes littering the stones. Over the last doorway on the right hung a sign featuring an improbable act between a cow and a naked man.

“You think that’s where minotaurs come from?” Damico asked.

Lotianna blushed and bowed her head, but the other party members laughed.

“Hey, Brandon,” Gorthander said. He must have been talking to Carl in the real world. “How come you’re only charming when you role-play Damico?”

Damico stopped and stared at him. Then he looked at Lotianna. No wonder he was able to have real conversations with her. When Carl passed on what Damico said, it must sound like it came from an actual Human being and not, well, Carl. Charm was all about lines and line delivery, after all. Carl must be able to pass on what he said
exactly
.

He’d have to think about the implications of that.

They pushed in through the heavy oaken door.

There are some universal truths about taverns. They all smell slightly damp, every one of them has at least one forehead-shaped dent in the bar, and when the front door opens, every patron cringes away from the light and squints.

There wasn’t a free table in the corner. Damico stopped suddenly, and the rest of the party crashed into him.

“Where are we going to sit?” Omar asked, his voice sounding lost.

Damico took charge and sauntered over to a table in the middle of the room. He sat down and gestured for the rest to follow. One by one, they did.

There was something different about this bar. The people laughed and talked. A barmaid dodged a playful pass from one of the patrons, balancing a tray full of mugs in one hand. Two kids, dressed in dirty smocks of unbleached wool, played something like jacks in the corner.

“This is strange,” Damico said.

“What is?” Gorthander asked, scanning the room.

Damico didn’t know how to explain to Gorthander that the people here were coming alive. Carl wouldn’t pass the information along. He tried anyway, and two frustrating minutes later Jurkand shrugged.

“I don’t know why he doesn’t understand,” Jurkand said.

“It has to do with game logistics,” Damico said.

“I don’t understand that either,” Jurkand said.

“Don’t worry about it,” Damico said.

The barmaid was coming.

“Hi!” she said, approaching the table. “My name is Bolzig, and I’ll be your barmaid tonight. Welcome to the Happy Cow!”

“Bolzig?” Omar asked.

“I created it with a computer name generator,” Damico said, casually, hoping that Carl would repeat it without thinking.

Omar and Gorthander both laughed. Arithian chuckled, and even Lotianna smiled. Carl
was
passing things on in the same tone and delivery as Damico. When he bothered to pass them on at all, at least.

“I don’t get it,” Jurkand said.

“I’m taking shots at Carl,” Damico said. Only then did he remember he didn’t know if he believed this was Carl’s game anymore. He didn’t know
what
he believed.

“Who’s Carl?”

Damico didn’t know how to explain that without saying Carl was God, so he smiled at Barmaid Bolzig. She was far too pretty to be named Bolzig. She had the nicest blonde hair with dark roots.

“We’ll all have ales except for the lady. She’ll have wine.”

“Lemonade,” Lotianna said.

“Lemonade.”

“Ok,” Barmaid Bolzig said. “I’ll be right back.” She bounced off into the crowd.

Damico frowned at Jurkand. “What do you make of this?”

“You’ve affected these people.”

“Without ever being here?” Damico asked.

Jurkand shrugged. “I wasn’t
that
nearby when you affected me.

Damico nodded.

He had felt something more like himself since Lotianna had begun acting like a Human being again. He hadn’t been able to get her to talk, but just spending time with her bolstered his spirits, and she didn’t seem to mind. She might not be talkative, but if anything, she seemed to enjoy it when he spent time with her again.

But that didn’t stop the drain. He could feel it more now, greater and greater with every person he met. Sucking at his soul, devouring his energy, hungry like an American kid.

And it was killing him.

He didn’t want to die. He wanted to go on, to strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield… or any other Tennyson poem you might like to quote. These were real people. Real people doing real things. He wanted to be with them forever, to be one of them. To just live with them.

To live period.

He could be happy here, if things were different.

He was willing to accept it. Still, now he knew what he’d been missing. He smiled at Lotianna. She averted her gaze shyly.

But she smiled back.

Chapter
Twenty-Five

“No quote this chapter. Deal with it.”

—Bob Defendi

uldron wasn’t the sharpest knife in the bandolier.
You could tell by his name. Carl’s greatest creative achievement was naming a spider demon “Spidra.” He required pre-written notes to talk his way out of a speeding ticket. He couldn’t invent a reason to go to the bathroom.