Hellblazer 1 - War Lord Read Free Page A

seem to have a silver cord about me. Short one ectoplasmic lifeline back to the body.”
    “That’s a sign that you’re amiss, you’re lost, wandered off, recruit—and too far from your body!” Futheringham broke off a moment to ogle the bartender pouring a beer. “Blimey, that lager looks good. Got a taste for lager in India—you want something light and cool, there. Wish I could have a drink myself.” He sighed and turned back to Constantine. “Anyhow, allow me to clarify one point, recruit: you don’t have to become a corpse to work with us. Truth is, we need one of the living, preferably someone with some talent. Used to the Hidden World. Great deal to be done. Got to avert a war.”
    “A war, is it? Colonel there’s no avertin’ ’em. They get a fucking life of their own. I’ll be nipping off now before you start reciting ‘Gunga Din’—”
    “Aren’t you wondering why you don’t remember coming here, why you were so disoriented? Slipping into the River of Nepenthe, washing down to the great Sea of Soul, eh? Wouldn’t want that prematurely. Got things to do, you have. Adventures awaiting.”
    Constantine shook his head. “I’ve had enough adventures, cloth-ears. Want some peace and quiet—but not your kind. A glass of bitters, something cupping me packet, a packet of smokes—and I’m happy as a clam.”
    “Not you, Constantine. You’re the restless kind. Hunger after the secrets of the Hidden World. Think you’re a great adept? Barely scratched the surface.”
    Constantine snorted, turned away from the dead colonel, and walked determinedly to the nearest wall. There was a dartboard on it—and a dart flew into his etheric body, right through the place his heart should be. Someone crowed in triumph as the dart hit the bull’s-eye with a thunk. Constantine hesitated—then closed his eyes and walked through the wall, dartboard and all.
    When he opened his eyes, he was on the sidewalk, watching a group of skinheads come sniggeringly his way. Crawling with racist tattoos, chanting “Oi!,” they seemed morally feckless—lost, confused, and under some kind of malign influence, all of it woven into one inexorable trap.
    Wankers. Far too many of their sort about—more all the time, in some places. Made a man want to leave the world entirely.
    But then I’m lost myself. Not supposed to be here. Futheringham is right . . .
    He suspected he had gotten lost on purpose. Trying to escape himself. Get away from the burden of just being John Constantine. He had almost managed to forget. But the memories were coming back . . .
    He was missing his physical self, but he could feel the bruised body of his life, quivering with painful memories: all the messy decisions, all the greasy gray areas, all the mistakes he’d made and all the horror he’d seen. His mother’s death; the body of the murdered child he’d found in the quarry; his childhood with his self-pitying, sneering, abusive, drunken father; the nightmare of Newcastle and Nergal; his ordeal of self-punishment in Ravenscar mental hospital for the mistake that had sent a child to Hell; the deaths of good friends, who’d made the mistake of getting too close to him; his visits to the literal Hell . . . where his father had begged for his pity. It was all there with him—still a part of him.
    Now Constantine watched the skinheads bowl past in their Screwdriver jackets and outsized black boots, and remembered a time when he’d allowed himself to become numb to the world.
    A bodiless state, Constantine thought, has its privileges. He looked up at the sky and willed himself upward. He began to ascend like a balloon without enough helium in it, very slowly, drifting this way and that . . .
    He got as far as the top edge of the building the pub was in and stopped in midair—glaring down at the sidewalk. Where was he supposed to go now? Arabia? Someplace back east, wasn’t it? He couldn’t remember which country Futheringham had mentioned. He was