The Price of Life Read online

  The place could be described with several variations of the words dirty and sleazy. It was the kind of place you go to drink when you’re not legally supposed to be drinking or not legally supposed to be doing something else. There were always people sneaking in and out through the back doors and whether they were dodging dealers, loan sharks, cops, or ex lovers remained up for debate. The floor seemed like it was made out of old trash, vomit, and a selection of other unidentified substances waiting to be cleaned off. The walls were tainted black with old cigarette smoke and reminiscent of Dickens’s Victorian England, except there was no industrial revolution to use as an excuse for the squalor. The drinks weren’t bad, but the glasses were, as Miriel had noticed earlier that night. As far as bars go it was disgusting. The only reason it stayed in business was because no one asked for I.D. and no one asked questions. There was always noise, whether it was a fight or someone’s drunken exploits being yelled in the background, it was impossible to be overheard. Even the people who knew Elle’s profession didn’t care what she was doing. Lucian took one last glance over the place, trying not to imagine what the inside of the bathroom would look like, made a disgusted face, and turned back to Miriel.

  “Am I supposed to call you Elle in front of the client, or has he been a frequent enough customer he’s allowed to know your name and I can call you Miriel?”

  “It’s Elle. It’s always Elle now, to everyone but you.” Miriel turned from the TV just long enough to look at Lucian and show she wasn’t all that mad anymore then turned back to face the screen.

  Lucian nodded and got up to get himself something to drink just as a man walked over to their table. The man looked nothing like the nervous but perpetually cocky businessman who Elle had just sent running out. He oozed confidence and charisma just by standing there. A world-class manipulator when he opened his mouth and eyes that would have been the cause of more deaths than Miriel and Lucian combined if he could get looks to kill. It was obvious he was there only because Miriel was the best, and he was the kind of man who only tolerated the best. He had the suit look down but wore it differently than the first client Miriel had. It wasn’t the suit, but the man who made it look different. He was taller and more distinguished, as if he was wearing the suit only because nothing else would do him justice. He looked like he was consciously trying not to show off but couldn’t help it if he did. The suit seemed like a second skin and moved with him as fluidly as if it were made of water.

  “I hope your friend didn’t leave on my account.”

  “I doubt it. Lucian never leaves on account of anyone.” Miriel gave her best fake smile and turned away from the TV to face her customer.

  The man nodded and sat down, turning to look at Lucian. He seemed intent on making sure Lucian was coming back to join them and ignored Miriel until he saw Lucian heading back with a drink -- in a bottle not a glass.

  “Lucian, I believe?” The man stood up and held out his hand which Lucian only took because Miriel was glaring at him with a ‘play nice’ look and he wasn’t in the mood to deal with her more upset than she already was. “I’m Kristopher, with a K, not a Ch,” the man stated as though spelling made all the difference in the world.

  “Of course you are.” Lucian slumped down into a chair and stared darkly in front of him. A shadowy acknowledgement passed between the two men, as though they’d heard of each other before. Kristopher looked proud of himself but Lucian just looked suspicious and angry. He threw a few looks at Miriel but she was either ignoring him or didn’t notice. Kristopher did, and he seemed to enjoy Lucian’s discomfort, almost proud of himself for being the cause of it. Neither one of them spoke to each other familiarly and Miriel remained oblivious to the situation, assuming Lucian had chosen now as a good time to be an ass. Not that this was any different from any other meeting. Lucian enjoyed making people feel uncomfortable and insecure. Kristopher didn’t seem to be affected and Miriel felt proud to have brought Lucian a match.

  “Now Elle already knows the details so there’s no real work to talk about today. I just wanted to meet you because this is the first time she won’t be doing a job for me alone. I like to get to know the people I’m working with. Here’s my card.” Kristopher tossed a card to Lucian. All it had printed on it was a name and address. There was no hint of an occupation, no fax number, no email address. This was not a card Kristopher handed out often.

  Lucian took it and continued to glare. “Why are we killing him?”

  Miriel looked at Lucian in shock. That was the one question he’d taught her never to ask. When you kill for a living you shouldn’t get in the habit of trying to justify what you’re doing.

  “Consider it a sacrifice,” Kristopher’s tone stayed serious but he smirked through his words as he got up and walked outside.

  Lucian watched him go, making sure he was long gone before he finally turned to Miriel and put a hand on her arm. “Call him and say you refuse the job.”

  “Why?” Miriel was genuinely shocked.

  “Do it, Mi.”

  “I’m not giving up this much money unless you give me a good reason.” Miriel looked at Lucian and for the first time in her career started to feel afraid. He seemed serious and that was a problem. Lucian was never completely serious about anything he said to Miriel, and when he was serious he was talking about himself. Lucian had never met anyone he felt was worth warning Miriel off a job. Until now, it seemed.

  “Because, Mi, he needs to offer the sacrifice himself.” Lucian stared hard at the trail the man had taken out of the bar before snapping back to reality. His face stayed serious. “Mi, how many people have you killed for him?”

  “A dozen. Give or take.”

  “Clever bastard,” Lucian muttered. “Have you ever seen him get his own hands dirty?”

  “You just met him. He’s not that kind of man. Why else would he come looking for us?”

  “So you’ve killed at least a dozen people in his name and he hasn’t gotten his hands into any kind of mess.”

  “None that he’d admit to. He’s a politician. Lucian, what the hell is this about?”

  “And who suggested this was a two person job?” Lucian was staring out into space again and Miriel wondered if he was hearing anything she said.

  “He did, but I suggested you. There’s nothing to be paranoid about.” Miriel tried to read Lucian’s face to see if he was worried about getting set up, but it remained stoic. “Look, Lu, he’s an asshole, sure, and quite a rare breed. As far as jobs go, he’s level. He has as much to lose as we do if he gets caught.”

  “I doubt that.” Lucian’s face started to break out into an appreciative smirk. “He’s good. Very good.”

  “Lu, I’ve known him for years, not once has he ever raised suspicion. Nausea sure. I wouldn’t mind killing him if the work ran out. He’s as slimy as they come, but he’s not out to get us off the streets. He came looking for me, not once did he ever mention knowing you.”

  “Because he’s good!” Lucian chuckled. “There never were real jobs, not with him. At least not in the traditional sense. He’s been using you.”

  “No one knows I work with you. I’ve kept that quiet.” Miriel’s hand slowly fell to the knife at her hip, worried Lucian was ready to kill her for betraying him or that he’d just gone crazy and would kill her because she was the person closest to him.

  “Put it away, Mi.” Lucian barely had to glance at her to know she was reaching for a weapon, one of his uncanny talents. “This was never about you. He knows me. That’s how he got your name. He’s been trying to contact me for years but I wouldn’t have anything to do with him. Clever bastard finally figured out a way.” Lucian laughed again and Miriel became even less convinced he hadn’t finally snapped.

  “Damnit, Lucian, did you get me caught up in your religious shit again.” Realization finally started to dawn in Miriel’s mind and she smacked Lucian in the back of the head, but her hand fell away from her knife. “I kill for profit not practice. You
said you’d keep me out of it after the first time you brought you cult into my life. We had a deal.”

  “I have nothing to do with this. He’s the one who didn’t adhere to your strict no involvement policy. I’ve never really understood why you’re so averse to what we do. You’ve killed enough. I can’t see how it’s a shock.”

  “We’ve had this conversation before. You’re the closest thing to a friend I can have with this job, a constant companion. Murder and human sacrifice aren’t the same thing to me. If there is a hell beyond this one we’re already living in I’d rather get sent there for murder.” Miriel got up, her face quickly draining of color as she tried to rush out the door and realized something was holding her back. Lucian had grabbed her arm before she could do more than stand up. His hand was clamped firmly around her wrist and his eyes dark as he forced her to listen. Lucian had never touched Miriel before and the idea of him being able to hold her down, someone whose whole life depended on the ability to get free of any trap, made her rethink their partnership.

  “I’m not sure if there’s a hell or a heaven, or any kind of place that resembles life after death. That isn’t what we do. I can’t promise you something better and I can’t promise you protection from the effects of what you’ve done with your life. I can tell you that if there is a hell, and you’re one of us, you won’t stay for long. We always come back, not remembering what we’ve seen is just part of the price we pay. You’ve already paid the other. A hundred times over. You’ve seen the news, you know all about the war that’s just inches from spilling over into our lives. You’ve been paying the price of immortality everyday for years. Say the word and I’ll give it to you. Please, Mi. You’re going to need it.” His voice was softer now and Miriel finally turned to face him instead of staring at the exit. “With men like Kristopher out there it’s a small price. Just let me keep you alive.”

  “Alive for what, Lucian?” Miriel smiled sadly as she turned back around to walk out. “For every one person who believes in you and what you’re selling, ten of us think you’re crazy. You have to know that.”

  “I know, Mi, but the war’s coming over here sooner than you think and people are going to get desperate. Desperate people do desperate things. It’s nice to have insurance.” Lucian was trying his best to plead with her but it was hard for him to fit emotion into his voice. Finally, he just loosened his grip on Miriel’s arm and she slipped away to the door. “Take the job. I’ll help you if that’s what you want, just to keep things normal,” Lucian called after her.

  Miriel nodded and kept walking. Lucian leaned back in his chair, watching Miriel until she disappeared in the same direction Kristopher had.

  3. Three Years Before the War

  “Couch,” Lucian nodded to Miriel and slumped down into the cushions without waiting for an answer.

  Miriel was perched on an armrest with a bottle of water. She never drank anything stronger than water before a job and she rarely ate. It was a good way to keep her mind from wandering and it had helped with nerves when she first started working alone. Now it was just habit, and a bit superstition that if she stopped now something would go wrong.

  Lucian tossed around on the couch for a few minutes trying to get comfortable. The couch itself was black leather, the only piece in the apartment that looked new and expensive. Miriel had gotten it because it seemed like something an assassin would have in their secret hide out and she wasn’t without a sense of humor. Lucian had laughed at her when she bought it, said she was stupid and the couch was ridiculous, but that hadn’t stopped him from using it.

  “I’m getting up early.”

  Lucian nodded. He had blood coming from the corner of his mouth and his hair was matted to his head with a cold sweat. Miriel handed him the rest of her water. She was never sure how Lucian got into her apartment. She’d never given him a key or even an address. He just showed up and she just accepted it, even come to expect it. It should have been one of those things she worried about, but he hadn’t tried to kill her when he visited so she let it go. He was too violent of an ally to make an enemy and some battles aren’t worth fighting if you have no chance of changing the outcome whether you win or lose. Besides, Miriel liked the fact he always showed up. As much as she moved around it was comforting to know no matter where she had to run Lucian would show up a few days later. He’d been around a lot more often lately and Miriel assumed she’d finally landed in the same city he lived in when he wasn’t working with her.

  Miriel, sometimes Elle, sometimes Miri, sometimes Mira, sometimes Ella, sometimes almost anything else, and Mi only to Lucian, had a pretty well hidden history. Other than her parents having an odd taste in baby names she never really talked about them. She once let it slip to Lucian that her father had done something with the military before the war had officially started, but that was it. That small fact did go a long way in explaining why she was so good at her job, but not why she did it. Miriel didn’t enjoy killing people the way a serial killer, or Lucian, did. It was strictly business to her. If she wasn’t being paid for it she wouldn’t do it. People live, people die, and life goes on until everyone’s blown up everyone else. At least that was Miriel’s attitude about things, probably left over from living with her father. She’d built up quite a reputation on her own but Lucian had always been around, even at the beginning. Lucian was attracted to anything that promised close-up, one on one, reasonless murder, and in his mind getting paid didn’t count as a good reason. He agreed to work with her on jobs she couldn’t do alone as long as he got the bodies and was able to make the actual killing stroke. Miriel needed the help to keep up with a growing client base and she wasn’t one to ask questions. If the body disappeared she didn’t bother to ask where. The two made a perfect team.

  Lucian’s heritage was widely known even if it wasn’t widely acknowledged as true. His father was supposedly an underground cult leader who had built up his congregation at the start of WWI. They offered hope in a hopeless time and people flocked to them because they were desperate. It was also rumored the cult was much older than that, a rumor Lucian neither confirmed nor denied. Not even to Miriel. The group was said to practice a form of necromancy involving human sacrifice that made them immortal, another rumor Lucian never commented on.

  Unlike Miriel, Lucian was born heartless. Cult rumors true or not, Lucian just liked killing things. It was a religion to him no matter what was true about his cult, and it was a personality trait Miriel found difficult to accept. In spite of their difference of opinion on whether or not murder should make you feel warm and fuzzy inside, the two had formed a solid partnership. Well, as solid of a partnership as they could form with someone they could never be sure wouldn’t poison their food or stab them in their sleep.

  “You look like hell, Lu.”

  “Thank you, Mi, and here I was thinking we were going to go out tonight,” he spoke through clenched teeth, trying his best to sound like he wasn’t in pain. He finished the water Miriel had given him and lay back on the couch, breathing heavily and continuing to sweat.

  “Do you need help? Like a hospital, witch doctor, anything?” Miriel looked at him with concern from her perch on the armrest. This wasn’t the first time he’d come over looking a mess and he always seemed to get better quickly, but it was unnerving. Miriel didn’t want to deal with a dead body in her apartment. It wasn’t the place for them.

  “Get ready for work,” Lucian did his best to sound annoyed and tried to roll over on his stomach to end the conversation.

  Miriel shrugged and turned off the lights as she walked out the door. It wasn’t that she didn’t care if Lucian was sick or not, but chances were by the time she got back he’d be on his feet and ruining her apartment. There was nothing for her to do but walk out the door and get on with her life while Lucian did whatever it was he did to get better.

  Most assassins worked closer to dusk than dawn, but Miriel had always been more of a morning person. Not to mention people in cities nev
er seemed to go home at an appropriate time, up all hours of the night doing things they’d be ashamed of when they woke up the next morning. If they even remembered what those things were. It was much safer to go out closer to dawn, fewer people were up and those who were couldn’t care less who you were killing as long as the blood didn’t get on their new jogging shoes.

  Miriel met several of these joggers as she made her way to a small, cheap looking apartment complex. Not one of them acknowledged her existence and less than that would be able to say they saw her at all. It was hard to believe any mistress would give her life away for such a cheap apartment, but times weren’t as good as they used to be and cheap was better than homeless and dead. The nice thing about cheap apartment buildings, for Miriel at least, was easy access to a fire escape. No one bothered to lock things up or keep things private because no one cared. There was nothing to steal and breaking in would be more of a time-waster than anything else. People rarely thought about those occasions on which someone like Miriel would come to visit them, although most of them didn’t have enemies with deep enough pockets to hire her. Except, of course, the poor soul who did. Miriel had already forgotten her name, she knew the asshole in the bar had given it to her but she stopped listening to him once it turned out he couldn’t close his mouth once he opened it.

  It didn’t take Miriel long to get to the right apartment and even if she hadn’t taken the time to climb up the slowly rotting fire escape ladder silently her chances of being noticed were slim. It was amazing how soundly people could sleep, especially when they didn’t want to be bothered with noises in the middle of the night. Miriel smiled to herself as she opened the back window to the mistress’s apartment, not out of happiness or excitement, but amusement at how easy some people made her job. The mistress’s window had been left unlocked and cracked open. It was hard to tell if this was done out of negligence or hope a certain, more welcome, visitor would come crawling through looking for escape from his wife. Not that it mattered.