

CATHOLIC GUILT AND THE JOY OF HATING MEN

by Regan Wolfrom

SMASHWORDS EDITION

Copyright © Regan Wolfrom 2012

Book Cover Design by Christine Ko

Stock from Conrado/Bigstock.com

To my wonderful children. This may be the best they get for an inheritance.

CONTENTS

1. High Times at the Sixth Annual Succubus Sisters Garage and Bake Sale

2. The Zombification of Amanda Hackensack

3. Gnome on Girl on Gnome: A Love Story

4. The Siamese Candidate

5. The Raven's Head Dagger and the Custom of the Seas

6. Vegans Are F**king Delicious

7. Maddy McKay and the Elves in Her House

8. The Ocean Goddess and The Home Run Queen

9. Born Again At Granny's Cave

HIGH TIMES AT THE SIXTH ANNUAL SUCCUBUS SISTERS

GARAGE AND BAKE SALE

**I FIRST** met Maggie at the McDonald's drive-thru on El Segundo Boulevard. She had the second car in line, and when the driver in front got out of his Audi to protest the lukewarm temperature of his Coke Zero, she'd been the first to come up with a workable solution, pulling an aluminum baseball bat out from her back seat.

There was something graceful about the way she smashed out both rear headlights, dressed smartly in a white wool pea coat, her long blond hair swaying in time with the bat. She carried that rhythm flawlessly from luxury car to a region of empty space not far from the terrified man's head. I don't think she intended to hit him, and she seemed pleased when he jumped back into his car and drove away, side-swiping the golden-arched exit sign as part of his retreat.

I'd never seen a woman as tough as Maggie, outside of Sister O'Hannan from catechism class at San Clemente, who'd selflessly taught me everything I needed to know about catholic guilt and the joy of hating men.

I got out of my car and walked towards her as she finished waving her bat at the long-departed douchebag.

"I'm Heather," I said as I extended my hand. "You seem to have a gift for intimidation."

"I'm Maggie," she said. "It's well-practiced, you know. I have a whole lot of brothers and a shitload of ex-husbands." She smiled. "How 'bout you?"

"I've been with a lot of men."

I'm not sure why I said that.

She laughed.

We talked for a while, no one in line behind us having the balls to tell us to move out of the way, and we seemed to hit it off. I was laughing so hard I could feel my whole body shaking.

She made me feel good about myself.

Maggie invited me to come out to a bonfire at Dockweiler Beach that night, and trying to sound cool I said that I'd see if I could make it.

"See that you do," Maggie said as she walked back to her car. "We could use more redheads."

It didn't take me long to find Maggie and her friends on the beach; they had by far the biggest bonfire and the largest crowd of onlookers, probably because Maggie and her friends were standing around the fire pit completely naked.

There were about a dozen of them, all just as gorgeous as Maggie, sitting, talking and laughing under the flight path of LAX, wearing nothing aside from their beaded friendship bracelets; I was taken aback, since Maggie had failed to mention that none of her friends owned clothing.

She waved to me as I approached, as did a few of the spectators, one of whom shouted out his heartfelt wish that I show him my tits.

"I made you a present," Maggie said to me, dangling a hand-woven pink and gold bracelet from her right hand. "So take off your clothes and stay awhile."

"Isn't this against the law?" I asked as I accepted her gift.

"The park provides the firepits."

"I mean the naked bit."

"I don't think anyone's going to lodge a complaint about my naked bits," Maggie said with a smile. She took a quick glance down my front. "Yours are doing pretty fine, too."

I didn't sign up for naked, so I simply smiled and shook my head, not sure of what to say.

"Don't be modest," Maggie said.

"I really don't feel comfortable \--"

"Don't let me down, Heather." She gave me a little pout; it was very cute. "You took the bracelet, so now you have to strip. It's like Mardi Gras, but for sober people with self respect."

I giggled a little, and didn't try to stop Maggie as she pulled off my shirt. Then came my shorts, and before I knew it I was naked and receiving a standing ovation from an eager public. I doubt Sister O'Hannan would have approved, but I'm sure that weird old nun would have taken a peek.

Maggie took me around the fire and introduced me to everyone. There was Mia, who looked a little like a cat and told me I looked just like Amy Adams, and Juanessa, who had a lispy Puerto Rican accent and told me that I had the sexiest elbows she'd ever seen. The comments generally got weirder from there, but all of the girls were warm and welcoming, and they made it clear that they were very much interested in having me join them.

But I wasn't sure what it was I'd be joining, or what kind of group enjoys being naked on the only state beach in America where there's a one in ten chance of being shot in the parking lot.

"What do you guys do?" I asked.

"We're succubi," Maggie said.

"That church that Madonna goes to?"

Maggie laughed. "I'm a succubus, a sex demon."

"I find that hard to believe."

"It's more of a metaphorical thing. I'm not a real demon, obviously, but I have some kind of power over men..." She gave me a crooked smile and a little wink. "And quite a few women, too."

I believed her, particularly since with Maggie's arm wrapped around me I felt a little like I did when I'd first watched Mickey Rourke and Kim Basinger in 9½ weeks. My eighth-grade social studies teacher got fired for showing it to us; I'd later sent him flowers and a tasteful thank-you card.

"So... you're a sex goddess?" I asked, trying not to sound too interested.

"Yeah... but it makes more sense to call me a succubus... you know, because I suck the life out of people."

"Oh."

"Not really," Maggie said. "I leave my lovers drained but happy."

I could see the scene clearly in my mind, me lying on what I imagine would be Maggie's four-poster bed, a white sheet draped over me, my body exhausted but my heart soaring. Imagining it I felt my pulse racing, my palms sweating... I felt like I did the day when my high school volleyball coach finally got up the nerve to ask me to prom.

I could feel the warmth of Maggie's breath as she leaned in and whispered into my ear. "I'm not going to lie to you, Heather," she said. "Sometimes we do eat people..." She exhaled against my cheek. "But only the bad ones."

I wasn't sure if she was joking, but it didn't take me long to realize that I didn't really care.

Maggie and I talked a while longer by the fire, not just about seduction and exotic dishes but about our childhoods and old movies and about how we'd both gone through life getting by on our looks, as though everyone around us just couldn't say no, or "I'm married", or "can't it wait until after my mother's funeral".

We had a lot in common, but I could see that she'd moved on past my world of bad boyfriends and cheap wine. She knew far more about life and happiness than I could ever imagine.

I felt overwhelmed, and I lost track of myself after the cops kicked us off the beach at ten and we all got dressed and went out for fish tacos. We had a few laughs and more than a few jelly shots, and someone passed around some red and yellow pills to munch on...

I did a lot of things I didn't usually do, before morning found me naked and hungover in Maggie's bed. I'd felt a little dirty taking some of Maggie's spare change for the tolls, but once she kissed me goodbye that all went away.

My first kill came less than a week later.

Maggie and I took a drive in her gleaming white Roadster over to Little Armenia to do some hunting. Maggie tried her best to explain the location, saying that the Armenians weren't to blame for the neighborhood being the best place in LA County to find self-absorbed douches who no one would miss; she blamed it on Orange County Republicans and the mortgage crisis. I didn't analyze it... it didn't matter as long as she kept her right hand resting on my thigh as she drove.

We went to a tiki bar on Sunset and it didn't take long to meet some guys; we giggled like we were tipsy, and I swear to god a lineup formed, and then we had to figure out who the biggest douche was out of all of them. One guy in his early thirties stood out, not only from his Ed Hardy shirt but from his twice-mentioned affinity for Jägerbombs. Once he brought up the latest issue of Maxim magazine both Maggie and I knew he was the guy for us.

Just like skydiving, Maggie strapped herself in with me for the first jump. The guy turned out to be a romantic at heart, wanting to make love to both Maggie and I on a musty sleeping bag he'd spread out in the back of his Range Rover. It worked out well for us considering how many places there are in the hills to ditch a burnt-out douchemobile.

I had a couple of nibbles, but Maggie ate most of him; to be honest, it was not as bad as I'd expected, and while I certainly felt an urge to brush my teeth, I was left with a feeling of power that I'd never gotten from my summer internship as a dominatrix for war amputees.

I felt like centuries of manmade oppression were being swept away, tossed aside like a meat-stripped shin bone by two women who were building enough confidence to stand up for themselves.

The strangest thing about that night was that after we had done the deed, we never once felt like we'd be caught. They hadn't even mentioned the missing douchebag or the torched car on the news, and since Juanessa was a detective at Robbery-Homicide, she let us know that no one in the LAPD was spending much time looking into it.

"It's not some kind of morality play," Maggie explained a few days later while we waited for our waffles at IHOP. "We eat the bad ones and leave the good boys and girls to rest up for next time, simply because no one cares if the douches die. Half the time the family thinks the guy's just run off with a new mistress, or that he was into so much illegal shit it's pretty much a given he'd disappear eventually."

"Have any of you come close to being caught?" I asked.

"I've had a few close calls, but none of us has ever been arrested or anything. We're too pretty to get into trouble... you know that."

"That's true," I said. As far as the justice system was concerned we were all too cute to execute.

I changed the topic to Prop 8 as our Fresh 'N Fruities arrived. Maggie then gave probably the best impression of closeted Mormon missionary boys making out that I've seen so far, so funny that I even blew a little bit of syrup out my nose.

I was really starting to fall for Maggie... big time.

And the best part was that I was pretty sure she was falling for me.

The best indication I had that I was now one of the succubus sisters was when Mia asked me to make a contribution for an upcoming bake sale, to benefit the teenaged victims of paranormal romances.

At first it was awkward as I tried to figure out just what kind of baking was expected, as I generally don't consider any kind of raw flesh to be good in cookies or cakes, but Mia soon specified that chocolate was the most popular flavor among their buyers. I knew right then that I had the perfect recipe.

I rushed over to my dealer to get started.

I baked four dozen chocolate chip cookies, going pretty light on the pot butter just in case any kids would be buying. I was pretty well-known for my cookies back home in Bakersfield, having been in charge of the snack tent for the Police Officers Association's Relay for Life three years in a row. I would have done it for a fourth, but by then the Hell's Angels had taken control of most of the charity racket in the Central Valley.

The secret is to boil out all of the green and then strain it through an old Kenny Loggins t-shirt before you mix it in with the butter. Then you bake it, no pun intended, and you cover it in saran wrap and use a little bit of ribbon to make an attractive little bow. A big part of it is the presentation.

I sampled one, just a bite, and I knew I hadn't lost my touch. My cookies would be a hit.

And I just couldn't wait to share them with Maggie.

She was surprisingly drunk for ten in the morning, but since it was a Sunday I didn't judge. She invited me into her apartment and after a quick session of doing what succubi do best, we sat together on her white leather couch watching the weekend forest fire smoke drift in from the southeast.

She'd put fresh white lilies into the long-necked crystal vase she kept on her side table. I leaned in and gave them a sniff.

"They're beautiful," I said.

"Everything in my life is beautiful," Maggie said. "Especially you."

I blushed.

I took a bag of my cookies out from my My Little Pony backpack, opened it up, and then I passed one over to her. She thanked me and took a bite, and I watched as a few crumbs tumbled delicately onto her spotless white carpet.

She chewed a little, then smiled, and then a little more before she swallowed. She smiled again.

But then she stopped smiling.

"Heather," Maggie said, "I need you to be honest with me."

"Sure."

"Is there something funny in these cookies?"

"Nothing funny," I said, "just some ganja."

She jumped up from the couch and threw the cookie onto the floor. "Are you kidding me?" she said, her cute little nostrils flaring.

"What's the problem?"

"You just fed me dope and didn't even warn me. Did you think that I would just go along with something like this?"

"What do you mean?"

"Don't tell me you were planning on selling these marijuana cookies at our bake sale!"

I took her hand and tried to nudge her back onto the couch but she pulled back.

And then she kicked me in the shin.

"I'm sorry," I said. "We don't have to sell them. I don't see why you're so upset with me."

"Mia was right about you. I should have known you were trouble, but you're just so goddamned pretty." She turned her back to me. "I've lost control... perspective. You've starting sucking up so much of me I'm not sure what's left."

I smiled and shrugged. "That's pretty much what love is."

"I didn't want that." She looked back at me and slowly shook her head. "I feel so stupid. Goddamn you, Heather Smith."

"It's Smythe," I said. "Please... don't ask me to go."

"I'm asking," she said.

She looked so sad now, and it made me ashamed. She was once so strong, that warrior woman from the drive thru, the one who knew her way around an aggravated assault. But now she loved me and it showed, and she was standing in front of me like a little lost puppy.

I couldn't leave her like that.

The other girls were worried about Maggie, wondering why she'd left without saying goodbye, but they all seemed to feel a little bit better as my special cookies became the hit of the bake sale, bringing in twenty dollars for a net gain of approximately thirty-eight cents.

I think Mia was suspicious, so I took her out for dinner on a quiet stretch of beach off Pacific Coast Highway. I laid out a feast of scallops and white wine on a set of Maggie's porcelain dishes and Riedel crystal, all sprawled out on the sand atop a white linen tablecloth.

I knew after that there would be questions from Juanessa, so I brought her out to a picnic lunch in the scenic wilderness just off Tuna Canyon Road. The tree-covered hills there make you feel like you're hours away from the city, and I chose a place for us with a view of where the rugged landscape meets the endlessness of the ocean and the blue sky above. I think she knew what I was planning but she didn't seem to mind.

By the time I'd chewed my way through the entire group, I realized that something had changed in me.

I said goodbye to LA and the meth labs of the valley beyond. Ads on craigslist and some rather mediocre fan fiction had led me to believe that there were more women like me in Portland.

I'll find them and I'll love them, and then I'll eat them and make it look like an accident.

But I know that one day I'll meet someone special, a beautiful woman I can love and mentor just as Maggie had done for me.

Whether I want to or not, I know I'll give myself over to her, that she'll be everything I am and more.

And then, if I'm lucky, she'll bash me over the head with a long-necked crystal vase and eat every last piece of me.

If I'm lucky she'll love me enough for that.

tHE zOMBIFICATION OF

aMANDA hACKENSACK

**" I WANT you to neigh for me," she said.**

I had no idea who was talking to me.

I'd already figured out where I was, from the smell of manure and the rustle of wood shavings beneath my sweaty running shoes.

She was giggling while she said it; I couldn't see anything but I could definitely hear it, the kind of chuckle the cool girls in high school use on pretty much every other girl to keep them in their place.

I used to do it, too. I was doing it just a few months ago.

I missed high school already.

"This isn't funny," I told her. "I can't see a thing."

"That'll wear off, stupid. _Gawd_."

"How can you know?"

There was a pause; I know she rolled her eyes right then. "It's so much easier dealing with men. You muffin-top girls are a waste of time."

"Is that supposed to be an insult?" I asked. "Like there's something wrong with not having a spray tan or a silver spoon crammed up my ass?"

"I think my nose is being thrown the biggest insult here. You smell like hog manure. Seriously."

I stepped towards her and felt my knee slam against a metal stall.

"You're locked in, stupid," she said.

"What? Why are you even doing this?"

Another pause, but I didn't sense an eye roll. "I'm not doing this to you, Amanda. You did this to yourself."

I heard her hard-heeled boots walking back down the concrete hallway.

Then it was quiet. And still completely black.

I think it was only twenty minutes or so before I started seeing light in my eyes. It was just a lighter shade of dark at first, but then it was like when you close your eyes and you're facing the sun. Then there were splotches, then blobs, and then I was in a box stall in a well-lit stable, at one end of what seemed almost an endless expanse of empty horse stalls.

The stall was like a prison cell, with iron bars running from the half wall up to the ceiling, and a heavy padlock on the gate.

I'd been shivering from the start in the wet air, still dressed in my basketball gear, and still unsure of what had come after I'd walked into the changeroom after skills. Did the other girls end up here, too? There was no one else in the stable with me, but since I'd never been locked into a horse stall before, I didn't have much of a frame of reference.

If I was living in a teen sitcom, I'd be the star player on the championship team, kidnapped by ne'er do wells from the other school just before the big game. Of course, I'm only on the team because there are hardly any girls in Dover who play basketball at all, and it's nice to be "good" at something; we've got one girl from Finland who'd never even heard of the game before we signed her up for skills camp. And Sayra's from Guatemala and has yet to figure out the meaning of man-to-man.

There's really no reason why anyone would want to kidnap me, some off-white girl from the poorer side of town who doesn't even know who her father is. I'm like the worst possible candidate for getting a ransom.

She came back after an hour or so, dressed in red jodhpurs and matching boots, along with a man who was dressed somewhere between a farrier and a farm vet. He was carrying a large duffel bag and a long yellow wand.

"See?" the girl said. "I don't think she's responded to any of it."

The man walked up to my stall and put his bag on the floor. And then he stared at me.

"Who the hell are you?" I asked.

He kept staring. "She's quite aware of her surroundings," he said. "Quite aware."

He took a key from his pocket and opened the padlock on the metal gate.

"Watch her," the girl said.

The man bent down and unzipped his bag. "I have ways to control you," the man said to me. He held up the yellow wand. "For beef cattle and crowd control. You'll be good, won't you, darling?"

I nodded. I always lie when I'm planning on kicking someone in the balls.

He opened the gate.

I went at him.

He stabbed the wand at my chest. The shock ran through my body, every muscle convulsing. I fell.

"Don't do that again," he said without any hint of surprise.

I nodded again. I meant it.

He checked me over, inspecting me more like a prized mare than a person, even checking my teeth like all I really needed was a good deworming.

"Do you know where you are, Amanda?" he asked me.

"In a horse stall," I said.

"Yes. A horse stall. In Vermont. Only a short drive from Rutland. Do you know where that is?"

"Not really. I've never been to Vermont."

He smiled. "And now you live here. There's a trail that runs north of here that takes you right over Gorham Bridge. It was built in 1842."

"Why should I care?"

"I don't expect you to," he said. "I'm just seeing if you're paying attention." He turned to the blond girl in the rich girl suit. "She's immune," he said. "Ms. Shannard was right about her."

"You're kidding," the girl said. "Like for real, immune? She'd said the same thing about how many others, but look where they'd all ended up."

"Immune. You can pump her full of however much fluid you'd like, but she won't become suggestive at any point. She'd be dead long before."

"Dead? How much would that take?"

"That is not how we do things, Cadance."

"Then what am I supposed to do with her?"

"Feed her to the pigs."

Cadance bobbed her head up and down. "Like... just throw her in alive and everything?"

"Can you guys stop talking like I'm not even here?" I asked.

The man sighed. "That was meant to be a joke. Ms. Shannard wanted me to bring her confirmation before she gives me further instructions."

"I don't care about her stupid instructions," the girl said. "You should be talking to my father."

"No, you should be letting me go," I said.

"Your father isn't in charge," the man said. "It won't be up to him. Just keep an eye on this one."

"I'm not a babysitter."

"No, you're a grown-up now, Cadance. Try to act like one."

He stared at me for a moment. He licked his lips and stared a little more.

He opened the stall and walked out, grabbing his duffel bag as he left.

He hadn't closed the gate.

I ran out past Cadance and turned towards the nearest door, the opposite way from where the man had gone. I pulled the sliding door open and stepped outside.

I looked back to Cadance, who was following me, but about as slowly as a person could walk. She looked more disgusted than worried; I'm tall but I'm not really that scary looking.

I kept running anyway, heading past two huge trucks and horse trailers, toward paddocks teeming with well-bred warmbloods.

I opened the first gate I came to, pushing past a few curious horse noses and continuing towards the distant tree line. I knew enough about Vermont to know that if i kept running long enough I'd end up somewhere with a crowd of syrup-guzzling tourists and their cell phones.

Cadance was still behind me, but the gap was widening quickly.

Something didn't seem right.

I climbed over the fence into another paddock, one field closer to the woods.

I didn't want to think about the muck that was collecting on my shoes.

I reached the end of the paddock, only a few feet from the trees.

And then I saw the real fence.

It was at least ten feet tall, and it bent inward at the top like the ones you'd see on National Geographic prison shows. I didn't have to figure out a way of squatting sideways and peeing on it to know that it was electrified.

That's why Cadance had no reason to hurry.

"There's nowhere to go," she said to me once she caught up. "You're locked in, Amanda."

"Where am I?"

" _Gawd_. You're in Vermont. What are you, like mentally challenged?"

I basically growled at her. "I might not be able to escape... but there's nothing stopping me from kicking your ass, princess."

"I have a cattle prod, too," she said.

I looked her over. "Where?"

"Dammit. The tack room..."

I'm not proud of it, but it did feel good.

I gave Cadance Snobbybritches probably the worst beating of her life. Like almost to a needing stitches level.

Well, okay... it was more like two punches to the mouth. But I've never hit anyone before. Usually a glare and some kind of huff is enough to send the right message.

I left her hunched up on the paddock fence and I made my way back towards the stables. There were six buildings in a row, with gray brick walls and a general look of despair. It was like some kind of horsey Auschwitz; I couldn't imagine anyone wanting to board their horse in a place like that. I picked a different stable building to check, using my nose to find the semi-sweet smell of manure. Just hay and water, as my aunt used to say.

As I neared I could hear the snorts and hooves. There was something calming about the sounds.

There was a large 'D' painted on the door with blood red paint.

I opened the sliding door slowly, hoping that whoever was inside wouldn't notice. Of course, that's near impossible in real life, and it squeaked like a field mouse on a hard diet of performance enhancing drugs. I stopped opening it about halfway, which was probably a useless gesture.

There were at least a half dozen men inside. But not one was looking over to me.

They were mucking the stalls, slowly and methodically and in complete silence, all dressed in old t-shirts and ratty blue jeans with holes in all the wrong places.

I don't know how to put this, but a couple of them looked like they could work in a barn, like illegals maybe, like the Fitzsimmons' have working for them at their barn up by Pine Plains. The rest didn't seem to fit in, two black guys, two whites and a very large man who was probably Chinese.

Most of the grooms my aunt had hired were teenage girls who couldn't quite afford the boarding fees. Working in a stable is like gymnastics with horse poop, whatever the opposite of a sausage fest happens to be. Some kind of party with hot dog buns...

I watched them work for a minute as I stood half in the door; they were acting like robots, picking up the manure and the soiled shavings and throwing them in the long wooden cart, without so much as a grunt. It's unnerving to see mucking without the chatter; I don't know what guys talk about when they work together, but I figured they'd talk about something.

I didn't feel frightened by the men... I felt more unnerved. I slowly walked towards the first stall being mucked, by one of the black guys. He was wearing a Florida Marlins t-shirt and jeans with an unexpected flare at the bottom.

He didn't seem to notice me standing beside him.

"Excuse me... sir," I said, trying not to sound condescending to the man with a shovel-load of horse shit.

No response. I figured he was just waiting for me to just get on with it.

"I need some help," I said. "I've gotten myself a little turned around in here."

He didn't even look at me.

I turned to look at the others. No one was bothering to acknowledge that I exist. I'm an eighteen year old girl; I'm not used to older men ignoring me outside of church.

"Hello? Are any of you guys going to talk to me?"

Nope.

I walked on past him, toward the other end of the stable.

Usually a girl in basketball shorts gets some kind of notice, like a guy or two checking out her ass, at the very least. I'm not a volleyball player, but still.

For a moment I almost thought I saw the Chinese guy glancing at the back of me as I walked by, but when I turned to look he was still scooping horse poop like before.

At about four guys deep, the other door opened and another woman stepped in, maybe around twenty or so. She was dressed in breeches and boots.

"What are you doing in here, missus?" she asked, looking at me. "You shouldn't be in here alone. And why are you dressed like a rugger?"

"I'm sorry?"

"Hold on a tick... who are you?"

I didn't know what to say. About who I was, or why she was speaking like she was British with a New England accent.

"Uh... who do you think I am?" I asked.

"You're not a boarder. Why the devil are you here?"

"I was just leaving."

She started walking toward me. I wondered if I was going to have another mouth to punch.

"Don't be daft," she said with a smile. "I've gotten all to cock in here sometimes. I'll help you find your way back."

"Uh... thanks."

We walked together down the aisle, the men still paying no attention to me. They didn't seem to notice her, either.

"These blokes are on work release," she said. "Minimum security and all that, but it's still not a terribly smart idea to be in here by yourself."

"You were about to come in here by yourself."

"Oh, I can handle these lags. I know the tricks."

"Where are you from, anyway?"

She smiled. "From right here. I'm trying to sound posh... you know?"

"I guess."

She glared at me. "Well I didn't ask for your opinion, did I?"

"Sorry."

She opened the sliding door and led me into another well-lit hallway, but one without any horse stalls. The one wall was lined with a row of metal doors like self-storage units.

We turned right and kept walking.

"Are you a friend of Cadance's?" the girl asked. She seemed friendly again.

"Acquaintances," I said.

"I could see that."

We came to a final metal door that looked just like the others, except that it seemed like a push instead of a pull. The girl took out a key card out of her pocket and held it up to a small reader box. The door beeped and she pushed it open, and then we stepped out to a well-kept yardsite. There was a large two-story house that looked just like what you'd expect to see in the Vermont countryside, painted shutters on the windows and a perfectly arranged ring of red and blue flowers in painted white beds.

"Is your car over there?" the girl asked.

"Maybe..."

"You're good to go?"

"I think so. Thanks a lot. I really appreciate it."

"No worries. I know what it's like to be new around here."

I nodded as I kept moving toward the gravel parking lot.

The girl smiled and turned back toward the stables.

"What are you doing, Tiara?" a voice called out. The man with the duffel bag.

"What's wrong?" the girl said.

"That girl there... she's one of the new hires."

"New hires?" She looked back over to me. "Blimey. So that's why she was in the back."

"My god you're an idiot."

"Bugger off," she said. And then she started running after me.

I started to run, too; I was relieved to see that I was able to move quite a bit faster. I was out of the lot and up the road before she'd even cleared the parked cars.

"You've got the controller, Gary," she yelled. "Close the bloody gate!"

I saw the gate as I rounded a bend in the road. And true to my luck, it was closing.

I didn't bother trying to speed up. It was closed long before I could have reached it, and the fence it sealed off was almost as high as the one in the back paddocks.

I sat down on the grass and waited.

Tiara and the man with the duffel bag arrived soon enough.

"This is one of the new hires?" she asked.

"Obviously."

"We're using girls now? And why the hell isn't she drugged?"

"I already told Cadance. She's immune."

"Bullocks."

"Please stop saying that."

She jabbed a finger into his shoulder. "Don't push me, Gary. I'm pretty sure you work for me."

"I work for your father, who works for Ms. Shannard."

"And she isn't here... so I'm it."

"You don't want to cross her, darling."

"I'm not scared of Kathleen Shannard," Tiara said.

"You should be."

She laughed. "Oooo... I think I just pissed myself."

The man sighed and looked at me. I didn't feel that much sympathy for the man who'd shot an electrical current into my boobs.

"You can't keep me here," I said.

"We can't let you go," Gary said. "So what are the alternatives?"

"As long as she digs her own fecking grave," Tiara said.

"What are you actually expecting from me?" I asked. "Am I supposed to live in a horse stall and shovel muck all day?"

"Among other things," Gary said. "That was the main point of bringing you here, yes."

"And drugging the seven shades of shit out of her," Tiara said. "But you couldn't get that part right, Gary."

"Do you understand the concept of immunity?"

Tiara knelt down and grabbed me by my chin. She stared into my eyes for a moment. "Take her back to the table," she said. "Drug her again."

"I'm not doing that. She's immune."

"You'd better be sure of that," Tiara said. "What if you're wrong? What will Ms. Shannard say then?"

"I'm not wrong," he said.

"You sure?"

"Well... it might kill her."

"I hope it does," someone else said. Cadance knelt down beside me, her mouth cut and still bleeding. "Do you see what this bitch did to me?"

"She kicked your ass," Gary said.

"Shut up. And pick her up."

"She's gotta weigh one-forty."

"Shut up," I said.

"If she dies on the table," Tiara said. "Well... problem solved, I guess."

"I suppose," Gary said.

He lifted me up and threw me over his shoulder.

I decided not to bother kicking my legs like an idiot. I knew I had no way to escape. They'd drug me again, whatever that meant. And I wasn't sure whether it would be a good thing for those drugs not to work.

So far the other options didn't sound too good.

They took me back into the long building that connected the stables, Gary carrying me past over a dozen doors before they found the right one, completely identical to the others.

Tiara unlocked it and Gary brought me to what I'm pretty sure was an operating table for horses, with a motorized crane hanging overtop and a bench with more padding than you'd expect.

My wrists and ankles were bound to the four poles at each corner of the table, with my head hanging ever so slightly off the edge. I'd expected them to strip me down, probably from seeing too many bad cartoons of alien probing, but that didn't happen. That's a good thing, what with my Hello Kitty underwear; it always looks a lot cooler in the store.

"I'm not dealing with the mess if she dies," Gary said as he put on a pair of latex gloves.

"Don't worry," Cadance said, "we'll feed her to the pigs."

"Again, Cadance... that was a joke. You'd better not poison my pigs with all the crap I'm about to shoot into this girl."

"You're not making me feel good about this," I said.

"It could be worse," Tiara said.

"It will be worse," Cadance said. "I'll make sure of that."

"Hold her by the neck," Gary said. "You, Cadance. And Tiara... try to pin her elbows. She needs to be still."

The girls held me down and it hurt like hell.

I didn't fight it. I've given enough blood to know that there's no upside to making someone miss your vein.

Gary took out a syringe and injected a light green fluid into my arm.

I laid on the table and waited, not that I had any other choice.

He watched me. I wasn't sure what he was expecting to see.

He licked his lips again.

Cadance kept her grip on my neck, pressing harder than she needed to but apparently a tiny bit less than it'd take to kill me.

"Now what?" I gasped.

"Nothing," Gary said.

No one did anything for almost a full minute, aside from Cadance's continuing squeeze on my airway.

"Yup," Gary said. "Nothing. I told you, Tiara. This girl's immune to the toxin. Just like Ms. \--"

"How can you be so sure?" Tiara asked. "I mean, honestly..."

"Well, she's still awake... she hasn't vomited... she hasn't soiled herself..."

"Can I go now?" I asked as Cadance loosened her grip on my throat.

"You're not winning us over," she said.

"We can't let her go," Gary said. "Ms. Shannard's told me what to do."

"We're supposed to kill her?"

"I won't tell anybody," I said. "Just let me go and I'll forget all about it."

"Now you're just pissing us off," Cadance said.

"You can't just kill me."

"I'm open to suggestions," Tiara said. "Give me something I can use to change their minds."

"We have to kill her," Gary said. "She's more dangerous than you girls realize."

Tiara stomped her feet like an eight-year-old. "You're not in charge," she said. "I'm in charge."

"So we should give Ms. Shannard a call to ask who's running things here? Come on, Tiara... your father's already hanging on a thread here."

"You're on a thread, buddy," Cadance said.

"Look," Gary said, "it's simple. Ms. Shannard gives the orders. She told me to bring these girls here and she told me to watch this one for immunity. So that's what I've done. And Amanda here is immune, just like she expected."

"So she got one right," Cadance said.

"We need zombies," Gary said. "That was the point of this. Amanda is not a zombie."

"A zombie?" I said.

"You really are mentally challenged," Cadance said.

"Is that what's wrong with those guys mucking stalls? You've drugged them up so they act like zombies?"

"They _are_ zombies," Gary said. "In the _vodou_ tradition."

"This is crazy."

"The pigs are getting hungry," Cadance said.

"Still a joke," Gary said.

"I know. I can be funny, too."

"I can be a zombie," I said.

For some reason that led Cadance to start squeezing my neck again. "What are you talking about?" she asked.

"You want mindless slaves to do your bidding. I can do that. My father's a lifelong Republican."

"You're no good to us." She tightened her grip a little.

"It won't work," Gary said. "You can't just pretend to be a zombie."

"No," Tiara said, "It might work. I mean, I guess it might... you know, since no one even told me that we're changing our entire business model."

"That's not the plan," Gary said. "We'll go with the other two girls. We'll just have them work harder."

"This whole thing is a stupid idea," Cadance said. "We can handle the men; we should have just gotten another load from Sugarbush."

"Tell that to Rarity," Gary said.

Cadance let go of my throat. "Rarity was stupid," she said. "She let them take her."

"Rarity was our sister," Tiara said. "Don't you even care?"

"Wait," I said. "Rarity is a person's name?"

"It's a nickname," Cadance said. "From My Little Pony... _gawd_. Seriously. Mentally challenged."

"You know, just because you call someone 'mentally challenged' instead of 'retarded' doesn't make it any less offensive."

"You're offensive."

"The decision's been made," Gary said. "I'll handle it."

"And how are you planning on doing that?" Tiara asked.

"I'll take her with me. I'll dump her in Lake George. I've had practice."

"You're not taking her," Tiara said.

"He can have her," Cadance said.

"No, he can't."

"I'm taking her," Gary said. He walked over to the table and looked me over. "Ms. Shannard told me to handle it. So I'll... handle it."

I knew what was coming. He licked his lips again.

"You're a sicko, Gary," Tiara said. "And you're not taking her. If she wants to play zombie, I say we let her. It's not like she's going to escape. So we hold onto her for a few days and then you tell little Ms. Shannard that we've chosen to keep her."

"So you're not going to let her out again?" Cadance said.

"If she tries to run or she tries to screw us, we kill her."

Cadance smirked. "We feed her to the pigs."

"It doesn't work that way," Gary said. "I need to report back to say I've done it. I need to take her with me."

"You do and you're fired," Tiara said. "I'll see to it."

Gary walked up to Tiara. He had a good twelve inches on her, not to mention the hundred and fifty pounds. "One of these days I'm going to take you to Lake George, Tiara."

She didn't flinch. "You'd like that," she said with a grin. "I'll let my father know about your friendly invitation."

Gary shook his head. "You know what? Do what you want. When Ms. Shannard asks me, I'll tell her the truth, that you wouldn't let me do my job. And then if your father still has his job when he gets back, he can kick me out of mine."

"Fallon Allen can't be fired," Cadance said. "This is our barn. Our great, great grandfathers fought the British browncoats on this very site."

"I've got work to do," Gary said, walking out of the room.

"I'll take care of this one," Cadance said. "If you can handle the rest, Tiara. They're in Stable A. Try to keep a few of them from escaping for once..."

Tiara rolled her eyes and left.

I was still tied to the operating table.

Cadance looked me over.

"How are you going to untie me?" I asked. "Aren't you worried I'm going to beat on you again?"

"That would be a bad idea," she said. "Not very zombie-like."

"So I should bite you? Isn't that what happened to Rarity?"

She slapped me across my left cheek. "Shut up," she said. "Don't you talk about my sister. I'll squeeze your goddamn throat until your poop-brown eyes pop out."

"I'd like to see that."

She grabbed me by the neck and started to squeeze.

For a moment I thought about letting her kill me. I didn't want to give her the satisfaction of an apology. But I didn't like the idea of nourishing Gary's pigs, or of dying in general.

I'm sure I have something to live for; for one thing I won't get kicked off the team until I'm twenty, as long as I take Introductory Japanese by correspondence.

"I'm sorry," I gasped.

She kept squeezing.

I wasn't able to say anything else.

I woke up in what seemed like a different horse stall, lying in the shavings in a puddle of my own drool. Not my proudest moment.

I realized I wasn't alone. There were two other girls lying in the stall, dressed in basketball shirts and shorts. Julia and Sayra. They'd been with me when we were taken; was it all because of me?

"Are you guys okay?" I asked.

I went over to check on them. Julia was asleep, but Sayra was staring into blank space.

"Sayra... are you alright?"

She didn't answer. She didn't acknowledge me. She might as well have been wearing a Florida Marlins t-shirt and flared-out jeans.

I grabbed Julia by the shoulders and began to shake her.

"Julia... wake up..."

Her eyes opened and she was looking right at me.

"Julia..."

She blinked.

"Julia."

She was looking right through me.

"Be glad they haven't noticed you," Cadance said.

I hadn't realized she was watching me from the hallway.

"When they notice you," she continued, "that means they mean you harm."

"Mean me harm? What does that even mean?"

"We don't understand how it works. It's not like Gary's the witch doctor. He's a disgraced pharmacist from Long Island."

"You don't really believe in this voodoo stuff."

"My father told me about Papa Doc Duvalier and his Tonton Macoutes. And about the _Marinette macoutes_ , the zombie army, and the sorcerors. It all sounded pretty fucking real."

"I guess that's why you're not a scientist," I said.

"I don't care what you believe. Either way, the toxins work most of the time as long as you keep injecting them regularly."

"They didn't work on me."

"Obviously. _Gawd_." Another eye roll. "But sometimes their system gets messed up or whatever and they go a little off."

"Off?"

"So if you see one of your friends looking at you, that means you either grab a cattle prod or you run. Oh... I guess you don't get a cattle prod."

"I'll just pick yours up the next time you leave it lying around."

"You know what? I hope one of your friends eats you."

"Eats me? What the hell?"

"Yeah. That's what happens." She smirked. "Have a good sleep, Amanda." She walked down the hallway to the door. "Lights out."

And then she flicked the switch.

Obviously I didn't sleep, since there was something unnerving about the idea of the team's center and point guard nibbling on my elbows in the middle of the night.

I didn't know what the drugs were doing to them, if it was something that'd be permanent. Were they as good as dead? Or was there a chance we'd all be back at Cousins in a few days, humming and hawing over whether or not we should get dessert?

I could see them both lying there, staring into nothing, their blank eyes shining in the dark.

I started to cry.

"Don't cry," someone said. A man's voice; I didn't recognize it.

I looked out to the hallway, but I didn't see anyone there.

"Who are you?" I asked.

"I'm a friend," he said.

"You expect me to buy that? Some creepy guy's watching me sleep and I'm supposed to be happy about it?"

"You don't remember me. Florida Marlins t-shirt. Ugly ass pants."

"What? But you're supposed to be a zombie."

"I just play one on TV," he said. "My friends call me Pouchon."

"So you guys are just faking it? Is this some kind of prank?"

"I'm faking it. The other guys probably aren't."

"Probably?"

"How the hell should I know? They certainly act like zombies."

"So you're saying you're immune to those toxins or whatever?"

"I guess so."

"So they kidnapped you, too?"

Pouchon chuckled. "Not really," he said.

"What?"

"I really am on some sort of work release program. Sugarbush Correctional Centre. Private prison equals business opportunity."

"You're a convict?"

"I accidentally killed a man over a decade ago. They got me for first-degree and decided I shouldn't get out pretty much ever."

"So they sent you here?"

"It's a good deal for the corporation. They still have me on the books so they still get paid, plus a nice little cut of the profits from this place."

"Profits? But this is a horse barn."

"There are other activities."

"Like marijuana or meth or something?" I asked.

He chuckled again. "Nah. Counterfeit teddy bears."

It felt good to laugh.

"That's not a joke," he said. "There's big money in teddy bears. And free zombie labor is a lot cheaper than trying to keep Chinese factory workers from killing themselves. All that suicide netting ain't cheap."

"But why have you come here? How did you get in here?"

"I have a keycard. Cadance loses hers about once a month, and they don't bother deactivating the old codes. I guess they don't think a zombie would have had the brains to use them."

"So what do you want from me?"

"I don't want anything from you. I want to help you escape."

"Why?"

"I'm not a bad person, girl. I don't want you to rot in here."

"What about my friends? Can you help them?"

He paused. "I don't think I can. I don't think there's any way for them to come back from that. If you'd seen what I have... what happens when the _macoutes_ need to feed..."

"Something doesn't add up," I said. "If you've had that keycard for however long, why haven't you escaped already? Why are you still here?"

"You're a smart girl. I'm a convicted felon. If I show up in town with some crazy story about zombies and phony plushes no one's gonna believe me. But they'll believe you. I need you to come with me, to tell them what happened here."

"I can't leave without my friends."

"You need to."

"We need to bring them with us. End of discussion."

"There's no way we can sneak two zombified teenagers out of here."

"Why not?"

"Our best bet is to get out of here and get help for them."

"What if these assholes kill them? Once we escape they'll want to cover their tracks."

"That's a fair point," Pouchon said. "Tonight might be our best chance, actually. It's Saturday night. The big man's out of town until sometime tomorrow, and Kathleen Shannard never drops in on Sunday mornings.

"What's so special about that woman?"

"Just be glad you won't get to meet her."

"What about her?" I asked.

"I was locked up for nine years with the worst criminals in Vermont... that's scarier than it sounds."

"I'll bet."

"Those guys are nothing compared to Kathleen Shannard."

"She sounds lovely. But... the plan?"

"Gary's probably gone home for the night, since like the rest of humanity he hates being around those girls longer than he has to. If we can immobilize those two twits we should be able to get help before anyone else realizes what's happened."

"Immobilize?"

"Don't worry... I'm not a murderer. Uh... anymore. We'll restrain them. Give them a taste of their own medicine."

"We're not drugging them."

"Figure of speech. Now let me find something for that padlock."

We made our way to the house, armed with the best weapons we could find in the tack room. Pouchon had a shavings fork and a small knife, while I carried a stack of leather reins and a roll of black electrical tape.

The house was dark aside from one small lamp light coming from upstairs.

"The kitchen door," Pouchon said. "They always leave it open with just the screen."

"You pay close attention," I said.

"Sometimes they put us to work out here, too. Maybe it's a test, to see if we're really as docile as we look."

"Test didn't work, I see."

"I've been waiting for this chance for a long time."

We snuck into the dark kitchen. Pouchon had us pause for a moment to adjust from the lack of moonlight inside.

We climbed up the stairs slowly; Pouchon seemed to know just where to step to minimize the creaking. I followed his footsteps as closely as I could.

We split up, Pouchon grabbing a couple of reins and heading left towards the bedroom that had light peeking under the door. I headed to the right. I opened the bedroom door and saw Cadance, asleep in her bed with a stuffed My Little Pony clutched in her arms.

I took the leather straps and walked into the bedroom. I was at least six inches taller a good thirty pounds heavier, but I was worried that my nerves would make me hesitate.

It was hard to think of the teenage girl with the pink horsey as a monster, but she'd held me down while they'd drugged me. She'd wanted to see me turned into a brainless monster.

She deserved it.

I put the electrical tape on the dresser and snuck up beside the bed. I grabbed Cadance by the neck and awkwardly flipped her onto her front. I had her wrists bound before she'd even figured out what was happening. I bound her ankles next, and pulled them up to meet her hands.

I'd hogtied Cadance in less than thirty seconds. I'd missed out on a career in rodeo.

I heard a woman's scream from the other room. It was loud but muffled. It frightened me despite me being in on the plan.

She kept screaming, for almost a minute. She was in pain.

Pouchon wasn't doing what I'd thought he'd be doing. He'd lied.

"Oh, god," Cadance said. "My sister..."

"She must be putting up one hell of a fight," I said. "Don't worry... he doesn't want to hurt her."

"Why are you doing this to us?"

"I'm saving my friends. You did this to yourself."

"Come on... this wasn't my fault. You can't do this."

"And so why us, then?" I asked. "What did we do to deserve this?"

"We needed you. That's... that's all it was."

"Why?"

"You already know why. We needed new workers to replace the _macoutes_."

"What makes us good workers? You just head over state lines to grab a handful mediocre high school basketball players?"

"Yes."

"How did you even find us?"

"Uh... YouTube. You guys did a video, that cinnamon challenge thing. We saw the uniforms so we knew where to find you. Shannard saw it and she got all weird about it... three dumb girls... strong and fit, but not strong enough to be dangerous."

"Dumb girls?"

"Well... cinnamon challenge..."

Pouchon strode into the room.

"That girl is worthless," he said.

"Did you hurt her?" I asked.

"She's okay." He took a minute to check my work. "Nice job... this little bitch isn't going anywhere."

"Easy, Pouchon," I said. "You've scared her enough as it is."

"There's no such thing as being too scared."

"That's not funny."

"Yeah, okay... now it's your turn."

"What?"

"Hands behind your back."

"What are you talking about?"

He pushed me onto the bed.

For some reason that was the moment Cadance started to cry.

"I wrote a story, Amanda," Pouchon said as he rolled me onto my stomach. "I've had two months in this place to plot it out."

He bound my wrists with one of the reins he still had. He hadn't used them on Tiara.

"Please don't," I said.

"Please," Cadance said. "Oh god... please..."

"Shut up," Pouchon said. "1:33 AM. Two of the _macoutes_ escape when their cell is left unlocked by Cadance being careless. No surprise there." He started to bind my ankles. "2:14 AM. The sound of a girl's screams brings Tiara down to the stable to investigate. She discovers that two of the young girls have been attacked and eaten by the two _macoutes_."

"That won't work," I said. "You can't just throw a couple of zombies into a stall and hope they eat whoever's inside." At least I hoped it didn't work that way.

"My first draft had Tiara screaming but then escaping for a second round. I was under the impression that she had... more star power? But I've decided to rewrite that part."

"What does that mean?" Cadance asked.

"What do you think it means? The zombies are going to eat her."

"Or so you're hoping," I said.

"Don't worry about it, Amanda. I'm a do-it-yourselfer."

"What?"

"Who do you think ate Rarity?"

"Oh my god..." I said.

Cadance started to sob.

Pouchon tied my ankles and wrists together. "3:01 AM. Cadance comes to the stable to look for her missing sister. She discovers the scene and decides that she needs to rescue that one poor girl who wasn't zombified." He tapped the back of my head. "That's you. She lets you out and the two of you run to the house, carelessly leaving the door to the stables open."

"That's a lot of carelessness," I said. "Pretty big plot holes."

"5:22 AM. The two _macoutes_ eventually find their way to the house and discover the two girls cowering in a bedroom. The zombies do what zombies do." He grinned. "That's the part where I get to eat you."

"Then what?"

"Doesn't matter as far as you're concerned."

"Indulge me," I said. "Maybe the extra terror of the story will make me that much tastier."

"You're being ridiculous. Don't be ridiculous." He shook his head. "Either way, Gary shows up in the morning and _chomp_. Then Daddy gets home a little later and, well, _chomp chomp chomp_."

"And so then the zombies run off into the night and you disappear. But won't they just think you're one of the three escaped zombies?"

"I guess I left out the part about the safe buried under the round pen and the millions of dollars in ill-gotten teddy bear money. Did I not mention the teddy bear money?"

"You inferred it earlier. I guess that was enough."

"Ha! I like you, Amanda."

"Then try not eating me."

"Oh god," Cadance said again.

"I'm a murderer," Pouchon said. "You know... a murderer who eats people."

"I don't get why these idiots would've picked you for this," I said.

"That's an endemic problem in the US Penal System. Some inmates learn how to be better lockpickers or gang bangers... I perfected a different skill. You know... I'll bet they don't churn out monsters like me in Scandinavian prisons."

"I'll be sure to set up a Facebook page about that if you let me live."

He chuckled again. I felt like I was trying to survive based on pure entertainment value. It was a better strategy than Cadance's "sob till you pass out" approach.

"Take the money," I said. "We'll rewrite the story. You'll be the hero who saved me and tied up these girls so I could run and get help. Then you felt you had to run away; they won't look too hard for you."

Pouchon looked me over for a minute. "Maybe that could have worked," he said, "but it won't work now."

"Why not?"

"Because I already took a big honking bite out of Tiara."

"Why?" Cadance screamed. "Why are you doing this to us?"

"Shut up," Pouchon said. He pulled a pink sock from his flared-pants pocket and shoved it in her mouth. "Do you know what they were going to do, Amanda? They were going to kill us."

"Kill you? Why?"

"Because they knew it was just a matter of time before the _macoutes_ attacked again."

"But it wasn't the _macoutes_. You're the psycho face chomper."

"Ironic, isn't it?"

"I'm not sure..."

"Once they had you girls up and working, they were going to starve us to death in those concrete cells."

"How can you be so sure?"

"They talked about it right in front of me. Big bad Kathleen Shannard herself, on and on with every damned detail. But why not? I was just a brainless zombie, remember?" He grabbed Cadance by the hair and jerked her head off the mattress. "Remember?"

"Don't kill her," I said. "She's just a kid."

"That's a slippery slope, Amanda. You're pretty much a kid, too. Hell, you can't even drink a beer yet. And that tasty dish in the other room isn't much older..."

"Come on..."

"She deserved it. And so does this little bitch. They took us from that prison and brought us here, and strapped us to that table and injected us with that poison..."

"Then you know what you should do? Rewrite the goddamn story. Take this little bitch down to the stables and strap her to that table. Let's pump her full of enough of that green piss that she turns into a leprechaun. Make her feel it, Pouchon."

He started to laugh. "Inmate doesn't mean idiot, Amanda. Do you think I'm going to fall for some stupid distraction?"

"I don't have a lot of options here."

"No... you really don't." He leaned over and kissed me on the forehead. "I like you, Amanda."

"You said that already."

"This isn't about you... or about this little twit. It's about me taking out every one of those animals. It's about me taking a chunk out of Kathleen Shannard's neck."

"A little lab work won't get in the way of that," I said.

He grinned. "I think you're right."

He left the room.

I twisted my body over to get my hands as close to Cadance's knots as I could. I couldn't see the rope and I'd barely found the loop to start pulling apart when Pouchon came back into the room clutching Tiara in his arms. She was bound with silk scarves but hogtied like us, or like Cadance, really, since she had the matching sock.

He dropped her onto the bed.

The right side of her face was bloody, but her eyes were open and she was conscious, a gaping red tear where her ear had once been.

"She's still alive," I said.

"You're a smart one," Pouchon replied. "It's not time yet. I had a schedule."

"So the medical examiner will wonder why her ear was chomped off an hour before your alleged zombie attack."

"Yeah... you're right," Pouchon said. "Good thing you're giving my script a little polish."

"Are you going to bite off my ear, too?"

"I don't want to..."

"Then don't."

He grabbed Cadance and picked her up. "She's nice and light," he said. "You girls be good, okay? Seriously... if you try to escape I'll cut your tongues out and make them into toffee or something."

He carried her out of the room.

I waited a couple of minutes, in case he was testing us.

I heard Tiara spit out her sock.

"He'll do us in for certain," she said.

"Oh, ya think?"

She started scuttling over to me. "We best hurry, Amanda."

"Yeah. In two shakes of a lamb's tail would be best, right guvna?"

She started pulling at my knots.

I tried to do the same to hers.

We both sucked at it.

"Cadence has a pair of scissors in her nightstand," Tiara said.

"Why?"

"Scrapbooking. Does it really matter?"

"I hope I made it into her zombie collage."

"I'll see if I can get the drawer open." She dragged herself over to the nightstand and started to fiddle with the knob.

She knocked it over.

"I'll do it," I said.

I rolled off the bed. I got the knob open pretty easily, and then I felt around in the drawer until I found the metal shears. I started dragging the leather reins against the edge of the scissor blade.

"Hurry up," she said.

"Do you know how long this is going to take me? Sawing through leather with a pair of scrapbooking scissors?"

"Feck you. Have you seen my ear?"

"Yeah... that sucks... sorry."

"We should cut these scarves on me first."

"I don't think so." I kept rubbing my wrists against the scissors.

I wasn't getting anywhere.

"Okay," I said, "we'll try the scarves."

She hopped down and took my place.

"It's working," she said after a few seconds. "It's cutting."

After another minute she'd freed her wrists. She untied her ankles and stood up.

"Okay... hurry up and untie me," I said.

She shook her head. "There's no time."

"You're joking."

"You're right. I wouldn't cut you loose if I had a bloody fortnight."

"Enough with the Brit talk already."

"Enough with the chitter chatter. I don't need you tattling on me to what's-that-bloke. Have a sock."

She grabbed the pink sock and stuffed it in my mouth; there's nothing quite like tasting fabric that's been pre-soaked in another person's drool. Then she grabbed the roll of electrical tape I'd left on the dresser and wrapped it around my head a couple of times.

"That's how you keep a sock in," she said.

And then she left the room.

I started wiggling back to the pair of scissors. I didn't know how much time I had.

I heard a gunshot before I'd sawed through the leather straps.

Just one. I didn't know what that meant.

I freed my wrists and untied my ankles. I pulled off the electrical tape and threw the pink sock on the floor. I didn't have time to fantasize about sticking it back in Tiara's mouth after a slight detour through the toilet bowl.

I didn't know who'd been the one to pick up a gun, but I made a guess that Tiara had the best chance at knowing where to find one.

I ran back to the long concrete building.

But then I realized that there was really no reason for me to go in there.

I could leave. I could run through the parking lot and up the driveway, and find some way over the gate. There were plenty of trees; I could climb up and jump right over. Better a pair of broken legs than a slowboat tour of Pouchon's digestive tract.

Cadance and Tiara weren't anywhere near innocent.

But Pouchon's story didn't just involve them. There was Julia, and Sayra, and the other three girls who'd thought "post it on YouTube? why not?"

I pulled on the door handle. The door was locked. I didn't have an access card.

I ran back towards the house. I'd call the cops. Then I'd find a way over that gate and I'd pray to god that the next person I ran into wouldn't enjoy the taste of earlobe or be named after My Little Pony.

"Turn your arse around."

I stopped. "I will only turn around if you stop with the 'arses', Tiara."

"I'll just shoot you, then?"

I turned around. She was holding a shotgun. I was no expert, but I knew it was easy enough to kill someone with one of those.

"You must have known I'd be coming back for you," she said. "I left you with the scissors."

"Are you going to shoot me?"

"Come inside."

"The house?"

"The stables. You really are dead from the neck up."

"I hate you." It probably wasn't the smartest thing to say to a woman with a gun.

She marched me back to the metal door, staying a good ten feet behind me.

"Pick it up and swipe in," she said.

"Pick what up?"

"Look behind you."

I looked and saw the access card on the ground a few inches behind me.

"Do it slowly," she said.

"You really think I'm going to try and jump you?"

"Just do it."

I knelt down slowly and picked up the card. I swiped it and opened the door.

"Don't kill me," I said as I slowly stepped through the doorframe.

And then I slammed the door behind me.

"Dammit!" she cried through the closed door. "Now I am definitely going to kill you."

"But I'm in here and you're out there."

"I have a spare access card at the house. Idiot."

"Better hurry," I said. "Before the zombies get loose."

I ran over to the lab, not sure who'd I find strapped to the table. I swiped the card and pulled open the door.

"Did you find her?" Cadance said as she turned around.

I punched her in the mouth. I've always loved the classics.

Pouchon was tied on the table. He didn't look like he'd been shot, but there was blood pouring from the left side of his head. Someone had taken his ear.

"Untie me, Amanda," he said. "These girls are insane."

"Yeah, right." I punched Cadance again.

"Stop hitting me," she said.

"Then sit down on the floor. Hands on your head or something."

She sat down and clamped her hands behind her head. "Where's Tiara?" she asked. "Did you hurt her?"

"That depends... how many ears did she have when you last saw her?"

"You're an asshole."

"Listen Cadance... you need to tell me where there's a phone."

"There used to be one in the lab here," she said. "But my father took it out because it was a separate line from the house phone and the phone company's just started raping everyone who still has a landline."

"I don't care. Where is there a phone now?"

"I told you. At the house."

"And I'll bet your cellphone's at the house, too?"

She nodded. "It's charging."

"Okay... we need to talk this out. What will it take for all three of us to walk out of here?"

"You want to let him go?"

"No. He can wait here for the cops. I meant you, me, and Tiara."

"No cops."

"Whatever. I don't care. I just need to know that Tiara won't shoot me."

"Yeah... I'm pretty sure she's going to shoot you. I mean... you know too much, obviously."

"Well that's just stupid," I said. "So now I'm going to have to kill her."

"Let's kill her together," Pouchon said. "Untie me and we can set up some kind of ambush. Like old times."

I laughed.

It didn't take me long to realize that Pouchon had the right idea.

When Tiara got the outer door open she didn't bother being quiet. She called out my name along with some very English words that sounded dirty enough to me.

I stood by the door to the lab, behind where it would swing open, holding a steel bedpan. I was tempted to try and fill it up before it was time to use it.

Cadance was trying to call out, but the latex glove I'd shoved in her mouth was muffling her well enough for Pouchon's unsettling laughter to drown out the sound.

He was loving every second of having a naked woman tied overtop of him, yet another reason why there's something just not right with the guy who keeps trying to eat people.

Tiara stepped into the room and screamed. "What the hell are you doing, Cadance?" she said. "Get off him!"

Then she noticed the gauze wrapped around her sister's face. She ran up to the table, the shotgun hanging over her shoulder by its strappy thing.

I stepped out from behind the door and swung the bedpan at Tiara's head.

She fell against the table, trying to brace herself without touching anyone.

"Ow," she said.

I'd expected her to be dazed, at least.

She shoved me and I dropped the bedpan before I had a chance at a second swing. She reached for the shotgun.

I decided to run. If she chose to untie her sister before chasing me, I knew I might be able to make it out.

"Get that thick arse of yours back here, Amanda," she said. "Or I'll shoot your friends."

"What friends?" I called back. And then I remembered.

"If you think leaving them behind would feel right awful, imagine how it'll feel to leave them to be shot and buried under the hay shed."

I didn't slow down. It wasn't like Tiara was going to spare my teammates just because I gave myself up. Their only chance was for me to get help.

I reached the outside door and swiped the access card, panicked for a moment that it might not work.

But the red light went green, and I pushed the door open and ran outside.

It looked like the sun was still a few hours from rising; I hoped that meant that I wouldn't run into Gary and his cattle prod on my way out.

I didn't have time to go into the house and look for a phone; Tiara would be coming for me again. I made my way through the empty parking lot and up the driveway.

The gate was wide open, and I wondered if my luck had changed.

Then I saw Gary lying in the middle of the road, a small plastic remote lying beside him. There wasn't much blood, but enough that I didn't expect him to be getting up right away.

I knelt down to check his pulse, or more realistically, to see if I even knew how to check someone's pulse.

I felt a hand clamp over my mouth and pull. My whole body was lifted upward, and I automatically started trying to kick whoever it was that was holding me.

"Who are you?" the man asked me.

"Health inspector?"

He let go of my mouth and I'm pretty sure I dropped more than a foot down to the ground, falling onto my knees in the process. I turned around to see the large Chinese man who may or may not have been checking out my ass in Stable D.

"I thought you were one of Fallon's daughters."

"I guess you're another fake zombie?" I asked.

"In a manner of speaking... except I'm not one to eat people."

"So you know about that."

"People like to talk in front of the apparent undead. Believe me, not every convicted felon has the same disregard for human life. I'm really sorry about that."

"You're probably the nicest murderer I've met all day," I said as I slowly stood up.

"I'm not a murderer."

"My apologies." I decided not to draw any attention to the possibly dead body lying at my feet.

"I woke up two days ago," the man said. "I don't recall anything that happened after I was transferred here in June. Not the work release program I'd anticipated."

"Yeah... I heard about that. Sorry. So why are you still here?"

"I don't know where I'm going."

"Well, Tiara could show up any minute, so I know where I'm headed."

"Be careful. They'll be looking for you. _She'll_ be looking for you."

"Kathleen Shannard? Have you seen her?"

"I've only heard of her," he said. "You should have heard old Gary here when he started on about her. Like she's Satan's mother-in-law. Just... be careful."

I gave him a nod before I started walking, because that's what you do, even when some guy's lying motionless on the ground; my parents raised me right.

I walked out to the main road and considered my options. I had no idea where I was. Near Rutland or something? Which in theory was in Vermont, which matched the license plates I'd seen yesterday.

And it matched the license plate of a silver sedan that was idling on the shoulder.

"Is this your ride?" I asked him.

"That was the plan."

"Well if you're not using it..."

"No, I'll be using it. I guess."

"Oh. Okay."

"Head to your left," the Chinese man said. "That'll take you into town."

"Are you sure?"

"I'm a Green Mountain Boy, born and bred."

I took him at his word. "Thanks," I said. "I don't mean to butt in, but is there any way you could avoid killing those two idiots?"

"I'm not a murderer," he said. "I'll do what I can."

"Uh... thanks."

I started walking up the road. I checked back every minute or so, but no one was following me. The car was still sitting on the shoulder, its headlights on and I assumed its motor still running.

It was cold by then, the wind chilling my bare legs. It's amazing how much that can slow a person down. It was dark and the moon was covered in cloud, and the road was completely empty.

I didn't know how long a walk I had.

I couldn't help but feel guilty for leaving my teammates behind. If the Chinese guy was able to snap out of the _macoute_ thing somehow... that meant I wasn't just turning my back on some brainless zombies.

I kept walking.

The first house I found along the road had some lights on upstairs; I rang the doorbell and a dog started barking.

A woman with long red hair answered the door. She was in a housecoat, but her face was caked in white makeup; she reminded me of that English queen who pasted herself up... Cate Blanchett.

"You poor thing," she said. "You must be freezing in that getup."

Soon I was invited inside and lent a pair of sweatpants and given a cup of the world's worst instant coffee.

They were a youngish couple, maybe early thirties, the husband a slightly overweight man dressed in hipster plaid. Their house was classic Vermont, with country french wallpaper and oil paintings of red barns and roosters, and a beautiful hardwood curio with a collection of antique tea sets. It's the kind of look you can only pull off if you actually live over there.

The man seemed panicked, his hands shaking as he dialed the numbers on his cell phone; the woman was calmer, like she knew that her tranquility was exactly what I needed.

"Your friends will be alright," she said. "The Sheriff's Department is good at what they do."

The man walked out of the kitchen with the cell phone, closing the sliding door behind him.

"It's okay," I said. "I'm not traumatized or anything."

"You're in shock," she said. "But that's good. You need time to process what happened."

"Maybe..."

"It's terrible what they did to you. I can't believe that the Allens would do something like this. Their family's been here for generations."

"So that makes them less likely to own slaves?" I said. And then I felt like an ass. "Sorry."

"It's okay... we'll chalk that up to the shock." She smiled.

The man came back into the kitchen.

"They've been dispatched to the Allens," he said. "They'll send someone over here when they get the chance. They told me to make sure you eat something."

"We have muffins," the woman said.

"Wow," I said. "You guys have quite the home here. Beautiful furniture and... uh... teapots, and fresh-baked muffins."

"They're from Costco."

"Oh. Sorry."

"Maybe just stop talking," the woman said. She seemed to catch herself, and smiled again. "You know... the shock and everything."

"So I'm going to go out and check on the chickens," the man said.

"You guys have chickens?" I said. "That's awesome. I'd love to see them."

"Just shut up, already," the woman said.

"Maybe I should wait outside."

"Good idea. Mike... take her outside."

"But I have to check on the chickens," the man said. "I need to make sure they're safe."

"I can see myself out," I said.

"No one cares about the goddamn chickens," the woman said. "I hope they eat every last one of those filthy, stinking birds."

"You don't like chickens," I said. "I can see that."

She was sweating and her face was changing; the caked-on makeup was running a little, and I could see what was underneath. A scar that ran from the edge of her lips up to her right temple. You'd expect to see old stitches scarring around it, like some kind of Frankenstein's monster cross-stitch... but it was just a gash, like something had cleaved open her head but she'd just stuck it back together with plastic cement.

"You're staring right at it," she said. "Don't you have any manners?"

"I'm sorry... it's just..."

She bent her head forward pulled back her hair. "Take a look... take it all in, sweetheart..."

She was missing her left ear.

"We don't have time for this," the man said. "It's two AM already. We have to get started. Fallon will be back before dawn."

"Shut up, Mike," the woman said.

"You shut up, Kat."

I stood up from my chair.

"Hold on," Mike said.

"I'm going to try the next house," I said. "You guys are busy."

He grabbed my elbow. I wasn't sure I could win in a fight.

"So you're Kathleen Shannard," I said. "Now I get why you hate me."

"I hate you because you've insulted me since you arrived."

"By accident, maybe." I didn't feel like apologizing. "So that wasn't the Sheriff's Deparment..."

"No, it was. You won't believe how high this conspiracy goes. All the way to the top."

"You're kidding."

"Yes. I am. Now go outside with Mike while I get dressed."

Mike led me out the side door and took me into the garage. He pulled out his keys.

"Get in the trunk," he said as he pressed the button.

I climbed in, making sure I knew where the inner release lever was in case I got the chance to run.

He slammed the trunk closed above me.

I listened to him walk around to the drivers side and get in.

He turned on the car and the stereo.

The garage door was still closed. The evidence was starting to mount that Mike was an idiot.

I waited a minute or so, and then I pulled the lever.

I climbed out of the trunk.

Mike didn't seem to notice.

I walked over to the overhead door and pressed the automatic button. I looked over to see him watching me.

"Carbon monoxide," I said.

He nodded.

I walked back to the trunk and climbed back in.

Mike didn't bother getting out to close it.

"Why the hell is the trunk open?" Kathleen asked as she stepped into the garage. She glared at me before slamming it shut. "I'm driving," she said. "You drive like an old Chinese woman."

Mike didn't say anything, but I heard and felt him awkwardly climbing over to the passenger seat.

Soon we were on our way.

"I called Davis," Kathleen said. "Told him to get started without us."

"We should head there first," Mike said. "Deal with the Allens after."

"And what if they leave?"

"We'll catch them. You need to be there to load the trailers."

"They've got the goddamn prods for that. If Davis can't figure out how to get them loaded... ugh... whatever... try calling Cadance. Tell her we're coming to help. Keep her there."

"Her phone's still charging," I called out from the trunk.

"And then call Fallon again, find out when he'll get there. I swear he knows something's up."

I heard the squeal of tires and the rev of an engine.

"Oh my god," Mike said.

The slam of metal was louder than I'd expected, and I felt my head slam hard against the steel frame. It hurt like hell.

I heard the car doors open, along with what must have been the sedan's.

"Shit!" Kathleen yelled.

There were boots scraping along the gravel shoulder, and then a gunshot.

I heard a woman scream.

I stayed in the trunk.

It was quiet for over a minute. Then I heard the sound of knocking, echoing in the distance. Three long knocks. Two short knocks. A pause. Two long knocks. Another pause.

I pulled the lever and slowly climbed out of the trunk.

The two cars had hit almost head on; it looked like Kathleen had tried to veer onto the shoulder, but whoever had been driving the silver sedan had reached us first.

I walked towards the banging, still tapping along in a pattern that made no sense. It was coming from the trunk of the sedan.

"Who's in there?" I asked.

Two more knocks. Whoever it was couldn't talk.

I ran to the open drivers door of the sedan and found the trunk release. By the time I'd reached the trunk again Cadance and Tiara were already climbing out.

"Why didn't you say something?" I asked.

"I don't know," Cadance said. "I was trying to do 'SOS' or whatever."

"Are you two okay?"

"We're okay," Tiara said.

"Good."

I took a look at where her ear had been bitten off. Someone had done a pretty good job of bandaging up the area.

"That was Arty," Cadance said.

"Arty?"

"The big Chinese guy. The one who took the shotgun and shoved us in the trunk."

"He seems nice."

"Are you going to hurt us?" Tiara asked.

"I wish," I said. "But seriously... we need to get out of here."

"We aren't safe," Cadance said.

"We can take my old banger," Tiara said. "It's back at the livery stable. If we can get there \--"

"You mean your car?"

"Yes."

I sighed. "I'm kinda hoping that Pouchon will find a way to bite off your tongue."

"Hate me later," she said. "Right now we should all be focused on staying alive."

We started walking back towards the stable, both Tiara and Cadance glancing from one side of the road to the next, like they expected Pouchon to come crashing out from the trees for a midnight snack.

There was another gunshot.

"He told me he wasn't a murderer," I said. "Of course, Pouchon said that, too."

"They're all murderers," Cadance said. "That's why we chose them."

"Because you're all idiots?"

"Because it's justice," Tiara said. "They take a life, and we take theirs."

"And where's my justice?" I asked.

"Anyone who performs the cinnamon challenge should be considered a write-off."

"I'm glad you're going to prison."

"Nothing's set in stone."

"Quiet," Cadance said.

We all stopped walking and listened.

There was a car coming up behind us. The silver sedan.

"We should cut through the woods," I said. "Get off the road."

"Go ahead," Cadance said. "We'll wait here for Arty."

"Am I missing something? You want him to shove you back in the trunk?"

"Better than getting eaten alive."

"What the hell are you talking about?"

"Nothing."

"Fuck me," I said. "What's out there in those woods?"

"Zombies," Tiara said.

"Wait... so Arty let them out? Those guys are wandering around out there?"

"Wrong zombies."

"What are you talking about?"

The sedan drove up beside us.

"Get in," Arty said, the shotgun propped up beside him.

"No trunk?" I asked.

"Trunk's full. I killed them... I didn't know what else to do with the bodies..."

The three of us climbed into the back seat.

Arty started turning the car around.

"We need to go back to the stables," I said.

"We're going to Derby Line," Arty said. "Easiest way into Canada. Once we're across you girls can do what you want."

"What about the bodies?"

"We'll dump them somewhere on the way... I don't know... I'll figure it out."

"Did you get the money?" I asked.

"Shut up," Cadance said.

"What money?" Arty asked.

"I can get it for you," I told him. "Millions of dollars, I heard. Take us to the stables and we can split it."

"Is this some kind of trick? Am I going to find Fallon Allen and several of his friends waiting for us?"

"No deception. Fallon will want me just as dead as he'll want you."

"Okay," he said. "But I get half just for me. You girls can split the other half."

"Oh..."

"You weren't going to split it," Cadance said.

"We're stealing it from you," I said. "Why would you get a cut?"

"There won't be any splitting," Tiara said. "He'll just do us in once he's got his hands on the quid."

"She's still doing that stupid British thing?" Arty asked.

"Won't take the hint," I said.

Arty took us back towards the stables. The gate was still open, but Gary had disappeared from the driveway.

"Did you kill him or what?" I asked.

"I'm not a murderer."

"Yeah, well you probably should have started with him."

Arty parked in the lot and the four of us climbed out.

"So where's the cash?" Arty asked.

"We'll need shovels," I said. "Right, girls?"

Cadance nodded. "I'm not doing any of the digging."

"You are so digging," I told her. "Oh, but while we're here you should pick up your purse."

She stared at me. She didn't know what I was up to.

"She doesn't need her purse," Arty said.

"Are you telling me she wasn't bitching to you about her goddamn pills? She wouldn't stop."

"You do need those pills," Tiara said. "Explosive diarrhea is no laughing matter."

"That is decidedly nasty," Arty said.

Cadance still looked confused. "I think it's in Stable B," she said.

"There should be shovels in the tack room there," Tiara said. "All in one stop."

"We need to hurry," Arty said.

We moved up the pace on our way to Stable B. I made sure I was front of the pack as we reached the tack room door. I went in and started grabbing the shovels, scanning the room for a yellow wand.

I saw a pink My Little Pony backpack. It was nowhere near being a purse, but it had a cattle prod leaned up against it.

I reached down and grabbed the prod. "I think I found your purse," I said.

"I'm freezing," Tiara said. "My trousers are wet. I'd be better off just in my knickers."

"What are you talking about?" Cadance said.

"You know what? I think I'm going to take them off."

I walked out to see Tiara pulling down her pants.

Naturally Arty didn't see me coming.

Once I'd stuck him with the cattle prod I dropped it and grabbed the shotgun. I'm not dumb enough to let Tiara take it again.

Cadance and Tiara tied him up with at least a half dozen straps of leather, before tossing him in one of the stalls and closing the padlock behind him.

Cadance picked the cattle prod up off the concrete floor.

"You can't trust those girls," he said to me.

"I don't trust you," I said. "You're too nice. It's kind of suspicious, you know?"

We left him in Stable B and made our way outside.

We headed over to the first stable, where the other girls and I'd been locked away; I made sure to be at the back, just in case one of Fallon Allen's daughters decided to try anything.

Cadance opened the door, and she and Tiara stepped inside.

"Are they okay?" I asked.

"See for yourself," Tiara said.

I walked into the stable, trying to hold the shotgun like I knew how to use it.

I pointed it at the two men standing in the aisle in front of us. One of them was Pouchon. The other was fifties, white, and surprisingly fit.

"Put the gun down," the older man said. "You just look silly holding it like that."

"Doesn't matter," I said. "I'll still blow your head off."

"Sure you will."

Pouchon stepped towards me.

I didn't know what to do.

I felt the jolt of the cattle prod on my ass.

Cadance laughed as I stumbled forward.

Pouchon took the shotgun out of my hands as he steadied me. "Sorry, Amanda. You're in over your head."

"Ya think?"

He smiled. "I still like you."

"Put them in the stall with the others," the older man said.

Pouchon looked surprised. "All three of them?"

"Deaf _and_ ugly... wow."

Pouchon opened the nearest padlocked stall, where I could see Julia and Sayra sitting in the straw. He nodded to me.

"Does he know you eat people?" I asked as I stepped into the stall.

"I'm an open book," Pouchon said.

I sat down beside Sayra.

She was looking at me. And so was Julia.

"Are you alright, Amanda?" she asked. Her speech was halting and a little slurred, but I had not trouble understanding.

I leaned in and wrapped my arm around her. "Oh, Sayra... I'm so glad you guys are okay."

"Now you girls get in the stall," Pouchon said, grabbing onto Cadance's elbow with one hand. He yanked the yellow cattle prod out of her hands with the other.

"This is a joke," Cadance said. "Dad... what is going on?"

"Don't call me that," the older man said. "You know I don't like it when you call me that."

"Then fuck you, Fallon," Tiara said.

I almost thanked her for not saying "feck".

"Please get in," Pouchon said. "Don't make me bite off another ear."

The two Allen girls stepped into the stall.

Pouchon closed and locked the gate.

"Now go get a shovel," Fallon said.

Pouchon started walking towards the tack room.

I stood up and walked over to the locked gate. "How can you do this to your own daughters?" I asked.

"Step-daughters," Fallon replied. "There's no blood here. Just two whiny anchors around my neck that I'll be shaking off momentarily."

"Congratulations," I said. "So what about the rest of us? Have you given any thought to letting us go?"

He laughed. "I see why Pouchon keeps talking about you, Amanda, why he almost fucked up the entire plan just because he thinks you're cute."

"I was thinking on my feet," Pouchon called out from down the aisle. "Maybe if you'd been around to help, Captain Alibi."

"Zombie or no zombie, you were supposed to kill her with the others."

"Haven't you noticed? None of these girls are zombies anymore. I'm guessing someone forgot to give them their shots."

"I missed a couple days," Cadance said. "It happens."

"That wasn't supposed to happen anymore," Fallon said. "I'm so glad you won't have another chance to fuck things up."

"This isn't fair," Cadance said.

"I think it is," Fallon said.

Pouchon walked back down the aisle carrying two shovels.

"Yeah, sure," Fallon said. "Like I'm going to be shovelling."

"It'll take twice as long if it's just me," Pouchon said. "That safe is under six feet of clay."

"Good point, man. We've got half a dozen _macoutes_ locked in their cells doing nothing. Let's go grab them."

"Let's hope Cadance has been giving them their shots," Fallon said.

"I remembered them," Cadance said. "I wish I hadn't."

"We'll be back, girls. You've probably got an hour or two before it happens. You should play charades or something."

The two men walked out of the stable, closing the door behind them.

I heard Fallon curse. The stable door opened up again.

"Where the hell are the trucks?" he asked.

"What do you mean?" Tiara said.

"Both trucks are missing. Trailers, too. What the hell did you girls do?"

"I don't know what happened. They were here this afternoon..."

"Goddamn Kat..." he said as he slammed the door shut.

"I think we're screwed," Cadance said. "Even if the drugs have worn off on those guys..."

"Of course they're wearing off," I said. "That's how Arty came to, isn't it?"

"Yeah... so what do we do?"

She was looking right at me. They all were.

"I don't have any ideas," I said.

"I don't understand," Tiara said. "Why is our stepfather chumming around with the asshole who bit my fecking ear off?"

"And killed Rarity," Cadance said.

"God..."

"Are they really going to kill us?" sayra asked.

"Probably," I said.

"If we're lucky he might ship us to the barracks instead," Tiara said. "Maybe we can convince my father to let us live."

"Your stepfather," I said. "What are the barracks?"

"It's where we keep the real zombies," Cadance said. "The guys we have here are step one in the process."

"Step one?"

"Three months of observation," Tiara said. "To see if the treatment is working... to check if they're suggestible enough. Then they're sent to Kathleen at the barracks... for training."

"Training for what? Mucking stalls? Making teddy bears?"

"There are no counterfeit teddy bears, you idiot," Cadance said. "And you girls are supposed to be in charge of mucking stalls after this batch."

"Then what's the training for?"

"She's building an army."

"An army? What for?"

Cadance rolled her eyes. "What do you think she'd use an army of zombies for?"

"Beating back crowds on Black Friday?"

"To take over the government. _Gawd_."

"But some of them escaped," Tiara said. "Things have gotten right pear-shaped of late."

"Escaped?"

"Yeah... two of them, hiding out somewhere in the woods."

"So even if we get out of here, there's a chance we'll get attacked out there?"

"I would have expected them to hear us when we were out on the road," Tiara said.

I sat down in the straw, leaning my head against the wall. "Fuck... me..." I said. I didn't know how anything could work out. Everything felt completely hopeless, but I was too tired to cry.

And then I was asleep.

Sayra woke me up, shaking my shoulders.

"What the hell is going on?" I asked.

"We don't know," Sayra said. "Something horrible. There were gunshots and screaming."

"So we're locked in a horse stall waiting to die and things may have just gotten worse?"

The stable door opened.

"Get out," Fallon said. He was frantically flapping his arms at us.

"No way," Tiara said. "We're not doing anything you tell us to do."

"Then sit here and get eaten. The _macoutes_ are attacking."

"The escaped zombies?" I asked.

"All of the zombies," Fallon said. "A goddamn army of them."

"So that includes the escaped zombies?"

"What the hell is wrong with you?"

"How did they get here?" Tiara asked.

"Well, they brought back my horse trailers," Fallon said. "Thanks for that. Pouchon's trying to block the front door, but they'll get through sooner or later." He pounded his hand against the metal gate. "Shannard planned the whole thing."

"She probably did," I said. "One big dress rehearsal. But don't worry... her body's stuffed in Gary's trunk."

"Why would Gary kill her and stuff her in his trunk?"

"Gary may or may not be dead in the woods."

"She's not dead," Pouchon said. "She's not so easy to kill."

"We don't have time for this," Tiara said. "Remember? Zombies?"

"We can just hide in the stall," I said. "I'll bet they won't even find us."

"Those _macoutes_ can hear your goddamn heart beating. They'll find us. If they have to pry these metal bars apart they'll get in here."

"So what exactly is your plan?"

"You girls will block them at the door. Hell, there's a chance some of you might even get out of here."

"That's stupid," I said. "There must be another way out. How do you get the horses out of here? They can't fit through the front door."

"I'm not an idiot. But I'm not leaving until I can get into that safe."

"And how's that going? Get any help with that?"

"Almost had my skull bashed in, actually." He grabbed Cadance by the shoulders and pushed her against the wall. "Thanks for that."

"I was hoping they'd kill you," Cadance said.

"Someone else might," Fallon said. "But I'm sure you'll get yours first." He threw her down into the straw. "And we're out of shells thanks to you. Pouchon had to kill three of them by hand."

"Poor guy," I said.

"You girls need to get over to the front door."

"Why should we listen to you?" I asked. "Why wouldn't we just bash your skull in like you seem to be asking for, and head out the back?"

"Because Kathleen Shannard's men will hunt you down and kill you."

"They'll kill you, too."

"That's why I need to get into that safe."

"The guns," Tiara said. "That's what he needs from it."

"There are guns in that safe?" I asked.

Tiara nodded.

"Then I guess we'd better get digging."

We took turns, two girls digging, one girl resting, and two girls holding Fallon down in the dirt.

Pouchon had made a start before, but it was almost ten minutes before we struck the top of the safe.

We heard gunshots.

"I thought Pouchon was out of ammo," I said.

"Do zombies shoot guns?" Sayra asked as she continued to dig.

"These ones can," Tiara said, her knee still embedded into her stepfather's shoulder blade.

"You people are seriously the biggest dumbasses on earth," I said. "Let's drug people up and turn them into zombies. Then we'll give them guns and see what happens."

"Most of them probably have machetes," Fallon said. "In Haiti they gave machetes to the _Marinette macoutes_ , since zombies have terrible aim. It's much easier for them to just start swinging."

"We should see if we can pull the safe up," Julia said.

"You should be put on that, Amanda," Cadance said. "You're about the same size as a draft horse."

Sayra and I started working to pry the safe up out of the ground, while Julia stood by to try and help lift it once it was high enough.

"Let me help," Fallon said.

Tiara looked over to me.

I nodded.

She climbed off of her stepfather.

He reached down into the hole. "We bolted on a couple handles," he said. "We're not idiots."

"Zombies with guns," I said. "You're an idiot."

We pulled out the safe.

"What's the combination?" I asked.

"I'll just do it," Fallon said. He started spinning the lock.

I held a shovel up over my head.

"What?" he said, looking up at me.

"I'm going to bash your head in if you try anything."

"Makes sense."

He finished spinning and pulled open the safe.

Inside were two black duffel bags, and on top of each bag was a handgun and a box of bullets.

"Do any of you little girls even know how to shoot a gun?" Fallon asked.

"It can't be that different from using a cattle prod," Cadance said. She reached in and pulled out a handgun.

I grabbed it out of her hands. "You're not getting a gun," I said.

"You think I'm going to waste bullets on your meaty ass?"

"I can shoot," Julia said.

I handed her the handgun and kept the other for myself.

Julia ejected the magazine from her gun. "They're not loaded," she said. She reached in and grabbed a box bullets. "We'll need as many of these as we can carry." She started loading the bullets into the magazine, one at a time. She saw me staring at her and smiled. "My sister likes guns. A lot."

I loaded my handguns the same way, with Julia checking things over before I popped the magazine back in.

"Are you really going to shoot them?" Sayra asked. "They didn't ask to be zombies."

"They'll kill us if they can," I said.

We put the boxes of bullets in the duffel bags, on top of what were wrapped stacks of hundred dollar bills; I would've expected more twenties.

"The keycards work on the back gate?" I asked.

"They should," Tiara said.

We hurried along the rutted dirt road that ran from the stables to the trees behind the paddocks. Fallon was with us; I wasn't about to shoot him.

I glanced back and saw a wave of men running in our direction, rushing out of the stable doors. They ran in formation, like a zombie civil war reenactment. They were completely silent, most grasping machetes, a few with what appeared to be rifles.

It was unnerving. They were on their way to kill us, but they didn't seem to feel anything about it one way or the other. No angry screams, no hesitation... just a line of _macoutes_ moving swiftly toward us.

"They've definitely seen us," I said.

I turned and aimed my gun. I pulled the trigger and it fired. I almost tripped.

"Don't waste bullets," Julia said. "You're not going to hit them from this far away."

"There aren't enough bullets either way," Fallon said. "You won't get a chance to reload."

We reached the back gate, wide enough for a horse trailer and just as tall as the rest of the wall. There was a small box mounted on a steel pole, along with a heavy chain and a heavier padlock.

Behind the gate were two pickup trucks, parked just outside like they were meant for something.

"Tell me you brought the key for that lock," I said.

"That's not our lock," Fallon said. "Or our trucks."

"Bullshit."

"That's not our lock," Tiara said. "They've locked us in."

"I know what this is now," Fallon said. "It's a killing pen. No way out. They're going to see just how well this army can kill."

"Not much of a test," I said. "A few dozen zombies against five girls and two handguns."

"I don't think that's the test they're running," Tiara said.

"What do you mean?"

"Six-man squads each spend three months mucking stalls. Testing to see if the chemicals are holding. Then off to the barracks for basic training. Then this, I guess... the last piece, to see just how suggestible they are."

"How suggestible?"

"Whether or not they're willing to kill a bunch of defenseless girls, and just how viciously they'll do it. That's the real test of an army, seeing how far they'll go to follow orders."

"But we're not defenseless," Julia said.

"I think they meant us to be," I said. "Too bad for Kathleen that she won't get to see the result."

The passengers' side door opened on one of the pickup trucks.

Kathleen climbed out.

Her left eye was missing; the left side of her face was pocked and shredded like she'd fallen asleep in a food processor.

She should have been dead. She probably was dead.

But she was looking at us with the eye she had left. Looking right at me.

And with binoculars hanging from her neck. She was here for the show.

"You were supposed to be unarmed," she said.

"You were supposed to be dead," I said.

"Not the first time. Where is Pouchon?"

"He's dead," Fallon said.

"I didn't ask you for your medical opinion. I asked where he is."

"Come on in here and I'll help you find him." He turned to me. "Just shoot her, already."

I pointed the gun, following the sight marks along the top; I was pointing it right at her.

"Don't waste your bullets," Kathleen said. "Do I look like I'm easy to kill?"

A man walked up behind her. He was carrying an assault rifle.

"Drop the handguns," Kathleen said. "Don't mess up our test."

I put down my gun.

Julia didn't move.

"Come on," Kathleen said, "drop it."

"Julia..." I said.

Kathleen turned to the man behind her. "Take her down," she said.

The man with the assault rifle took a shot.

Julia fell to the ground.

I wasn't the only one who screamed. I ran over to Julia.

She'd been hit in the leg.

"Not bad," Kathleen said. "We'll see if they'll kill a wounded girl. Maybe apply a tourniquet, Amanda, so she looks the part. And so she doesn't bleed out before the _macoutes_ reach you."

I took off my shirt, trying not to dwell on the sweat stains on my sports bra. I did my best to remember first aid, wrapping the wound as tightly as I could.

"You girls should start running around a little," Kathleen said. "Spread out."

"Are you going to get me out of here or what?" Fallon asked.

"We don't need you anymore."

"I'll kill you, Shannard."

"That's not how it works, Fallon. Being killed by a zombie doesn't make you a zombie... it makes you dead."

Fallon sat down on the ground. "I'm not going to run and hide," he said.

"Whatever, Fallon. I don't really care, as long as you're dead and eaten at the end of this."

I saw Fallon looking at one of the handguns lying on the ground. I knew what was coming.

He somersaulted towards the gun.

The man with the assault rifle started shooting.

Fallon stopped moving.

"Now go on, girls," Kathleen said. "Get moving."

I helped Julia up, her arm wrapped along my shoulders. She was unable to use her right leg, but working together she and I were able to get her hopping on her left.

We walked together as a group, along the fence, moving away from Kathleen and the assault rifle while trying not to get any closer to the oncoming zombies. But there wasn't really anywhere to go. With Julia we were slower than they were.

"We need to make a run for the front entrance," Tiara said. "Maybe one or two of us will get through."

"What about Julia?" sayra asked.

"We need to run."

"No," I said. "We should make a run for the horses. We'll have a better chance on horseback."

I helped Julia over the fence into the nearest paddock, and a couple of old mares walked up to greet us.

I boosted Julia up on one of the mares. She groaned from the pain, but she was able to hold on.

"I've never ridden a horse," sayra said as she came up behind.

"It's easier than you think to ride a horse," I said. "It's only near impossible to ride one well. I'll help you."

I knelt down on one knee beside the other mare and made a step with both of my hands.

"Climb up," I said.

sayra hesitated for a moment, but then she stepped into my hands and I boosted her up. She almost went over the far side of the horse's back, but she soon steadied herself.

Tiara and Cadance both climbed onto mounts of their own, Tiara hopping on from a jump and Cadance awkwardly climbing up the front of a Trakehner. I managed to find a quarterhorse, a short little chestnut that stood out among the taller warmbloods. I hopped on, and we started trotting our horses along the fence. If we were lucky we'd reach the stables.

We were circling around the _macoutes_ , but they'd been watching us, shifting direction and heading toward the stables as well. They weren't mindless; they were matching our moves.

"We're going to make it," Julia said.

"We need to speed up," I said. I brought my quarterhorse up to a gallop.

The other horses did the same, with or without being cued by their riders; no horse wants to be the one that's left behind.

I heard a scream, and turned to see sayra fall; she was clear of the mare's hooves, but I knew she wouldn't be able to catch her horse or get back on.

I didn't know enough about riding bareback to turn around and help her. I'd have to either get off my horse or leave her.

There was no way I'd be able to help her and still outrun the _macoutes_.

I started slowing my horse.

"I've got her," Tiara said. "Just keep going."

She brought her horse around and pulled sayra up.

"They're too close," I said. "They'll catch us when we dismount."

"Then we don't dismount," Cadance said. "We need to ride up the stable aisles. There should be enough clearance."

"Should be?"

She brought her horse up to the front and kept pushing, arriving first at the stable door. She leaned over and pulled it open, still straddling her horse. She moved on to the stable beside it, as Julia's horse was catching up.

"That's good, Cadance," I said. "Now ride up the aisle."

She took her horse into the stable, slowing down to a trot.

Julia's horse hesitated, but eventually followed.

I waited for Tiara and sayra.

The zombies had caught up to them.

"Keep going," I called out. "You can make it."

Tiara swung her right leg over and threw herself off the horse.

The _macoutes_ swarmed her. Her horse broke free with sayra on its back, trotting toward the stable.

Tiara didn't get back up. She was screaming.

I knew sayra would make it inside. I had to see if I could save Tiara.

I couldn't see what was happening to her; I took a few steps forward. She was crying, shrieking... and then it stopped.

I saw it; the _macoutes_ were feeding on her.

I slowly started back toward the stable door, hoping they wouldn't notice me.

But one of them was watching me. Then another.

I turned to run.

I reached the door and started to pull.

I felt a hand grab my shoulder.

One of the _macoutes_ threw me to the ground. More of them surrounded me.

They had me pinned, but not one had bitten me.

A _macoute_ stuck his face against my neck and sniffed.

"Just do it," I said. "Just fucking eat me."

But they didn't.

They slowly climbed off of me. They still surrounded me, but as I pushed past them toward the stable they didn't try to stop me.

I finished opening the door and walked inside, closing it behind me. The _macoutes_ did not follow.

Cadance led us into the hallway to the front door. We found the shotgun lying on the concrete floor. There was no sign of Pouchon.

"Where's Tiara?" Cadance asked as she swiped her keycard.

"She didn't make it," I said.

She nodded. "Just like Rarity. But you made it, somehow."

"I don't know why, Cadance. They let me go."

"Maybe they just hate my family so much they wanted to see you make it out of here."

She pushed open the door and stepped outside.

The three of us followed behind, Julia clutching onto my shoulder.

I didn't notice that Kathleen was out there waiting for us. Kathleen and the man with the assault rifle. And Gary, too, still looking a little dazed. And another guy, with yet another assault rifle.

"It feels like you cheated," Kathleen said.

"Where's Mike?" I asked.

"He's dead, thanks."

"We're not going back in there," I said. "You might as well just shoot us."

"She doesn't speak for all of us," Cadance said. "I don't want you to shoot me."

"No one needs to be shot," Kathleen said. "The test was a success."

"But they made it out," Gary said. "How is that a success?"

"Shut up. Tell me, girls... did you feel terrorized?"

"Uh, yeah," Cadance said.

"And the _macoutes_ did eat your sister..."

"Both her sisters," Gary said.

"Again, Gary. Shut up." She looked over to me. "Tell me, Amanda, do you feel that these zombies would be effective as an instrument of terror?"

"Yes," I said. "Your parents would be so proud of you."

"Good. Then there's no need to feed more of you to the _macoutes_. Why that's a waste of good breeding stock." She turned to Gary. "Restrain them."

"With what?" he asked.

"With the plasticuffs... in your jacket pocket... remember?"

Gary bound our wrists behind our backs, starting with me.

"So what are you going to do with me?" Cadance asked. "Are you going to let me go?"

"Do you have problems listening?" Kathleen said. "We're going to drug you up, like the other girls."

"Oh... I thought you were talking about the other three."

"Amanda's immune. Isn't that what Gary told you? So it would be pretty hard to turn her into a zombie if she can't be turned into a zombie. You following me so far?"

"So what are you going to do to her?" Cadance asked.

"Gary's taking her," Kathleen said. "Something about a trip to scenic Lake George."

Gary licked his goddamn lips again.

"I really think you should just shoot me," I said.

"I won't get into it," she said. "Just trust me that I'll be a lot happier if your corpse is weighted down at the bottom of a lake. Now if you'll excuse me, I have some _macoutes_ to round up." She turned back to Gary. "Put them in a cell. We need to count the corpses... there'd better be nine of them. Pouchon had better be there."

"Pouchon was nothing," Gary said. "I'm sure he's dead."

"You've always been too sure of things. I guess that's how you lost your pharmacist license."

He bristled but didn't reply.

They brought us into the building.

"The _macoutes_ must still be in the yard," Kathleen said. "I'm guessing you didn't give any of them access cards?"

"We forgot," one of the gunmen said.

"Dammit, Davis..."

"Well you weren't there."

She seemed surprised by the sharpness of his response.

"I'm... I'm sorry," he said. "I really am."

"Just open a cell," she said.

He did as she asked, holding the door open.

"Come on, girls," Kathleen said. "Time's a wastin."

We walked inside.

Davis closed the door.

There was nothing we could do but wait.

After about fifteen minutes, the door to the cell opened.

We all stepped back.

Arty appeared in the doorway.

"Don't worry," he said in a whisper. "I'll get you girls out."

He pulled out a small pocket knife and started cutting my cuffs.

"Sorry about poking you with a cattle prod," I said.

"I'm over it. Actually, no... if we get out of here I'm probably going to want to poke you back."

I smiled. "I don't think you meant that the way it sounded."

"We'll see," he said.

Once the cuffs were all cut, he picked Julia up and threw her over his shoulder.

"They're still looking for Pouchon," he said. "They can't find his body and they're worried."

"Why are they worried?" I asked.

"They think he's like her. That the _macoutes_ can't hurt him."

"Like they had a chance to kill him and they didn't?"

"Yeah, but I think there's more to it."

He led us out of the building and out to the parking lot.

"We'll just have to keep walking," he said. "Unless one of you girls knows how to hotwire a truck."

"They'll catch up to us," I said.

"We'll split up... head into the woods."

"Bad idea," Cadance said. "There are still two missing zombies out there."

"There are dozens of zombies back there," I said. "I'll take the two."

"We should stick together," Julia said from her perch. "Strength in numbers."

"I doubt that'll help," Cadance said.

"It can't hurt," I said.

We went into the forest, moving into single file through the beech and yellow birch. Sunrise was starting, which made finding our way a little easier.

Cadance was in front while Arty and Julia brought up the rear.

It was quiet, aside from some bird or other, and it didn't feel like the kind of place you'd find a _macoute_ lying in wait. It seemed like the kind of place you'd go on romantic walks with that guy you were sorta into, hoping he'd make up some lame excuse to brush up against your ass or something.

I heard something crashing through the trees in front of us.

Cadance veered to her left and started running.

I stopped and motioned for everyone else to do the same.

I saw the figures ahead of us. Two men moving quickly, their footsteps crunching on the undergrowth, moving after Cadance.

They seemed too quick to be zombies.

Cadance tripped.

"Leave her," sayra said to me. "She's not worth it."

The footsteps stopped. I couldn't see the men. I didn't know why they weren't moving.

I heard Julia scream.

I turned around.

Two more men were behind us. They'd pulled Arty down, and Julia had gone down with him. Arty was kicking and punching one of the men, but he was losing. I couldn't see Julia.

I reached down and grabbed the biggest stick I could find. I wasn't sure what I was doing.

I ran toward them.

I shoved it at the nearest of the two men, aiming for his chest. It struck him and cracked. He punched me in the neck and I fell into the needles of an evergreen, slamming my head against the trunk.

Julia started screaming.

" _Rete trankil!_ " a voice called out.

The screaming stopped.

I found my way out of the pine tree, pulling needles out of my hands. They'd impaled me with such force that my skin was broken and bleeding in places.

The two men were still, standing over Arty and Julia.

Behind them was Pouchon. His face was torn and bloody, but it seemed like he hadn't noticed.

" _Pati_ ," Pouchon said.

The two men walked into the trees and soon they were gone.

"What the hell?" I said.

"The escaped zombies," Pouchon said. "Hopefully they'll leave you alone now."

I knelt down beside Julia.

"I don't think I can walk," she said. "But that's nothing new. Oh... but the broken ribs are."

"I think Arty's dead," Cadance said. She was standing over him, not close enough to help or anything.

"Nice of you to come back," I said.

"I thought we were all going to run. Sorry."

Sayra came over and knelt alongside me. She gently put her finger to Arty's wrist.

She didn't say anything.

"Of course he's dead," Pouchon said. "The _macoutes_ attacked him first because he was the biggest threat."

"Smart _macoutes_ ," I said.

"Not your grandpappy's zombies."

"We need to get out of here," Cadance said.

"We can't move her," I said.

"We'll need to split up," Pouchon said.

"How are you part of the 'we' on this?" I asked. "Don't you remember wanting to eat me?"

"Oh, so you've got a choice all of the sudden? Unless you have the power to control the _macoutes_ , you're pretty much stuck with me."

"You're more dangerous than the macoutes," Cadance said.

"I'm not a killing machine," Pouchon said. "People change. And I'm more than willing to come to an understanding."

"Not interested," I said.

"Why not?"

"Because we can't trust you."

"Fine. I'll call my friends back over here for breakfast." He cupped his hand over his bloody mouth. " _Vini macoutes mwen_ ," he called. " _Vini_."

I couldn't see them yet, but I heard their footsteps.

"What do you want us to do?" I asked.

"Just you," Pouchon said. "I need you to go back with me."

"Why?"

"The money."

"Are you serious?" I asked. "You want to walk back to a place where there are two guys with assault weapons and a woman who apparently won't die... and all for a little bit of walking around money?"

"That money cannot be left behind for Kathleen Shannard," he said. "And I do what I'm told."

"By who?"

"By whom, you mean. By my master, Amanda. By _our_ master."

"What the hell are you talking about?"

"You're a zombie, Amanda... a _bokor macoute_ , a sorcerer in service... just like me."

"I'm pretty sure I'd know if I was a zombie."

He grinned. "That's the best part. You don't know. I didn't know either until I got the call." He looked over to Cadance. "That was thanks to you."

"I guess eating people's made you a wee bit insane," I said.

"I need to take your ear."

"What?"

" _Mwen santi Bondye vire do ban mwen_." He grabbed me by the neck. " _Tout bagay pa la pou lontan_."

"Please..." I said. I jabbed him in the eye.

He didn't seem to notice.

" _Tout koumansman genyen yon fen_."

He bit down on the lobe.

I screamed. I felt like I would pass out from the pain, but I didn't. I was there. I was feeling it.

And Pouchon was in no hurry. " _Nou renmen ou_ ," he said. " _Ou va pou tout tan nan bra Papa selès la_."

And then it was off.

He held the ear up for me to see. It didn't look like something that had been a part of me; it looked cold and shriveled.

" _Piga ou vire do ban mwen lè m'ap rele nan pye ou_."

I wasn't going to be able to wear my hair up anymore.

"You're invincible now," Pouchon said. "She cannot hurt you."

"Can you hurt me?" I asked.

"No one can. Other than our master."

"And who the hell is that?"

"We need to go."

"What about my friends?" I said. "And Cadance?"

"They'll be safe," he replied.

"Those two zombies will attack them the moment we are gone."

"Those zombies are coming with us. Call them."

"I don't speak voodoo," I said.

"You know the words..."

He was right; I did.

" _Vini_ ," I said. I started to walk back to the stables.

The two _macoutes_ followed behind me, as did Pouchon.

And somehow that didn't surprise me.

We stepped out of the woods and into the parking lot.

Kathleen saw us. She was standing with Gary. The two gunmen weren't there.

"You've returned, Pouchon," she said. "You killed my men and you almost killed poor Gary here. I'm not about to forgive you for that."

"I brought someone," he said.

"I know. Another _bokor macoute_. How exciting for us all."

"Yeah, I'm Amanda," I said. "We've met like a couple of times now."

"I know who you are. I've known about you for a very long time. Why do you think I had them bring you here?"

"The cinnamon challenge?"

"Marinette can't stop me," she said, "no matter how many fat American whores she fills with the rotten seed of her sons."

"This is starting to sound pretty personal."

"Who is your father, Amanda Hackensack? Why don't you carry his name?"

"It was a crazy time," I said. "Somalia, Tonya Harding, the last few seasons of Full House had really jumped the shark... there were a lot of bastards born back then."

"Your father was a _loa_... a spirit."

"I know what a _loa_ is... um... apparently..."

"That's what makes you a _bokor macoute_. Marinette asks for your left ear and in return she gives you power over your brothers in bondage."

"My brothers?"

"She means the other _macoutes_ ," Pouchon said.

"So what's stopping me from ordering every zombie in a mile radius from ripping you to pieces?" I asked her.

"What's stopping me from doing the same to you?" she replied.

"So it's a Mexican standoff."

"A _vodou_ standoff," Pouchon said. "It happens more than you'd think."

"My power is stronger," she said. "I am the mount of _Kalfou_ , the Master of --"

"Master of Crossroads," I said. "I'm aware." I wasn't sure how, but I decided just to roll with it.

I turned to face my two _macoutes_. " _Touye_ ," I said, _kill_ , the one command that would allow them to kill another of their kind. Of our kind.

They ran toward Kathleen.

" _Rete trankil_ ," she said.

The _macoutes_ stopped.

"Was there a point to this, Pouchon?" I asked. "There's two of us and one of her... does that give us something?"

"I'm here, too," Gary said.

"Shut up, Gary," Kathleen and I said at pretty much the same time.

"Yeah, there's a plan," Pouchon said. "Command them again."

" _Touye_ ," I said.

Pouchon launched himself at Kathleen, pushing her to the ground.

And then he started to kiss her.

She punched him in the face.

He elbowed her temple. And then he kissed her again.

And the two _macoutes_ fell onto them.

Kathleen couldn't command them to stop.

She didn't even have a chance to scream.

After a minute or so the _macoutes_ had finished feeding, and Kathleen and Pouchon were a mix of torn clothes, chewed bones and a fleshy goo.

"I didn't think she could be killed," Gary said. "I thought she'd outlive us all."

"That's why you're nobody's _bokor macoute_ ," I said.

And then I watched the zombies eat him.

I locked my two pet _macoutes_ in one of the trailers and found a cell phone in one of the trucks; I called 911 and told them I didn't know exactly what happened, but that people were dead and that my friend needed an ambulance.

I found the girls where I'd left them, Julia in pain and shock but conscious, Cadance in tears over what was to come.

"What's going to happen to me?" she asked me.

"It's all about you, isn't it," I said. "My friend has a bullet in her knee. And she was our best player."

"My sister's dead."

"I know."

"Will those men be okay?" sayra asked.

"The ones who are zombies or the ones who were eaten by zombies?"

"Julia and I got better... so maybe they can?"

"I think so," I said. Actually, I knew. "There was a man in Haiti who got better after, like, twenty years."

"What about you?" sayra asked. "Are you okay?"

I felt the power of Marinette, the knowledge of thousands of years of magic from lands I'd never seen. I felt her speak to me, in thoughts more than words. My mistress could be cruel, she told me; she wasn't going to hide the truth from me. But she'd given me her power to do what I felt was right, and she'd honor my decisions. I'd never felt so empowered.

And I was pretty hungry, and looking forward to a corner booth at cousins with the worst basketball team in Upstate New York.

I still hadn't decided whether or not Cadance would be invited; I assume she'd probably have Sheriff's deputies to talk to or whatever.

"Amanda," sayra said. "Did you hear me? Are you okay?"

I smiled. "I'm doing fine," I said. "I'm pretty sure this'll work for me."

Gnome on Girl on Gnome:

A Love Story

**DESPITE HER** best intentions, Marguerite Frunklin had never been in love before. She'd been in lust, as had all the girls back home in Ohio when they'd first found out James Franco was studying for a PhD in English, but love was something magical and mysterious to her. It was something she'd been forced to cobble together in her mind with a soulful blend of romantic passages from _Twilight_ and _Fifty Shades of Gray_ ; from what she'd seen so far, she was pretty sure true love involved at least a limited degree of emotional abuse and dumb and pretty girls taking orders from extraordinarily attractive jackasses.

Marguerite knew she was pretty enough, but she was never sure she could fake being that stupid.

"It's not like you had any boyfriends back in Ohio," her brother Bradley said as they stood along the Avenue in the old town of Sintra. They were waiting for one girl or another of his.

"You're a jerk," she said. "You used to be a lot less of one back in Ohio."

He grinned. "I also had braces and a lazy eye. Luckily I didn't have to bring those with me to Portugal. Things change, French Fry."

"Let's not play the nickname game. We all have a past, Bradizzle."

He punched her on the shoulder; he'd probably meant it to be lighter.

Two of the local guys were walking toward them; Diogo and Netuno, both dressed in soccer shirts and giving her a look.

She still felt like she was back in high school, standing by the lockers and being evaluated.

"They like you," Bradley said.

"Sure they do."

"They do. I'll tell ya, French Fry, if I was worried you'd ever close the deal with one of these guys, I'd have to start kicking a lot more asses."

"Shut up."

Marguerite silently prayed that the boys would find some distraction before they reached her. She felt nervous enough to vomit.

"Boa tarde," Diogo said with a smile.

She knew he was talking to her, but she pretended it was all meant for Bradley. She slowly looked down at her feet.

"You are going?" Diogo asked.

"Yes, I have to go," Marguerite said. "We need to get home."

"He's asking if you're going to his party, dumbass," Bradley said.

"Tell him no."

"Tell him yourself."

Diogo started to laugh. "You should go," he said. "It will be fun."

"I can't," she said.

"Why not?" Bradley asked.

"You know why not."

"No... I can't say I do." He wasn't going to help.

"I have to study."

"It's Friday night. No one has to study."

"I do," she said.

Bradley grinned. "No... I'm pretty sure you don't have anything to study."

"Then you can go," Diogo said.

"I can't," she said.

"You work too hard."

"I know. I... I need to go now."

She waved awkwardly and turned to leave.

"She's shy," Bradley said. "You may have to give her a few glasses of ginja to get her to... uh... open up."

Marguerite prayed to God that no one else caught the joke Bradley was going for. Since English was their second language...

"It's a joke," Bradley said. "You guys are supposed to laugh. I'm saying that you should get my sister drunk, Diogo."

Diogo and Netuno looked confused but they laughed, Diogo a little too heartily.

Marguerite could feel her face blushing.

"She's blushing, guys," Bradley said. "You know what that means..."

Marguerite couldn't take it; she couldn't stay to defend herself. Bradley would have kept on her like he always did, until she was in tears and everyone else was pointing and laughing.

Marguerite ran home and picked a fight with her father instead. It was his fault they were there, anyway.

_Maybe in Ohio_ , Marguerite thought as she lay on her bed. Maybe there she could have gotten somewhere with a boy, but now that her father had dragged them to Portugal she felt like she was drowning in a foreign language; she didn't know more than a couple words of Portuguese.

And she didn't know what the boys expected from her; did she need to be clever and funny, or was she supposed to simply smile and nod? The Portuguese girls didn't say much to Bradley; they just let him talk on and on about whatever, smiling politely until he'd start sucking on their faces. Would a boy like Diogo want this American girl to sit back and listen to him drone on in a language she could barely understand? She had no way of figuring that out, not without embarrassing herself completely in the process.

Marguerite just wanted to fall in love; she didn't want to have to worry about all the legwork.

Bradley didn't have those problems; he'd arrived in Portugal like a fully formed man of action. This new Bradley was nothing like the awkward boy with too many teeth who'd always hung around Marguerite and her friends, hoping his amazing ability to buy alcohol would lead to a girlfriend.

In Portugal Bradley got exactly what he wanted. He made it look so easy.

He'd taken more than a few of them to the marbled bottom floor of the Initiation Well, which would also be a pretty good euphemism for whatever he did to those girls once they got down there.

"It's to initiate the secret members of the Knights Templar," Bradley had told her once. "At the bottom of the well, representing the ninth circle of Hades, they'd swear an oath. They'd pledge their lives, swearing that they'd rather suffer forever in hell than bring dishonor to the rite."

"And that really works?" she'd asked. "You take them down there and give them a bunch of crap and they get all open for business?"

"It doesn't matter what I say... it's how I say it."

She remembered rolling her eyes at him, pretending that she thought it was all so stupid, but secretly wishing that Diogo or Netuno or... well, she wasn't sure about funny-eared Rafael... no, not Rafael... but wishing one of the boys would give her some bullcrap about ancient knights or solemn oaths. All it would take was one bronze-skinned Pork and Cheese boy to look past her boss-level of awkwardness... just one, and then Marguerite would finally know what all the fuss was about.

Until then, she'd lay in bed and wait. And play a little Xbox with some of her friends back home once they came online.

"It was a great party," awkward Rafael told her the next afternoon as he followed along beside her on the way to the butcher; Sintra is a town where there's always a bored guy or two hovering around the girls as they try and do whatever.

"You went?" Marguerite asked.

"Not really."

"Not really?"

"I walked by. It looked like fun."

Marguerite knew that Rafael wouldn't have been invited. She decided not to press any further, to spare his feelings and because she didn't feel like talking.

"Do you like Portugal?" he asked.

"It's nice."

"Yes. Even our bedrooms smell like fish."

That made her smile.

He smiled, too. "And every time you look down at your dinner plate, there's a set of eyeballs staring back up at you."

Marguerite laughed. It sounded like he was reciting a joke book.

"What do you think of the driving?" he asked, bouncing as he walked.

"Are you setting up a joke?"

He blushed and nodded.

She laughed again. "It's something," she said.

"In Portugal we spend as much time driving on the sidewalks as we do on the road."

She gave him a little smirk. "Not your best."

"Sorry," he said. "Your brother told me you play video games."

"Don't girls play video games in Portugal?"

"I don't know. I play video games. Maybe we should play sometime?"

"Maybe," Marguerite replied. She'd already lost interest.

As much as she wanted someone to notice her... no. Not Rafael. He just didn't count.

Marguerite spent the rest of her day out by herself, since her father had chosen to work from home rather than drive in to Lisbon on a Saturday, and the last thing she wanted to do was apologize for the most recent most terrible things she'd ever said to him.

He'd chosen his career over his family. He'd left Marguerite's mother locked in a hospital ward in Cincinnati. He'd given Bradley everything he'd ever wanted, while giving Marguerite nothing more than his pale complexion that would burn in minutes in the Portuguese sun if she didn't dunk her face in a gallon of sunscreen three times a day.

There was no way she would say she's sorry.

So on days like that she'd leave her Xbox and go out, wandering the mountains of the moon that towered over the town of Sintra, sketching in her notebook and identifying plants, and wishing for something unusual to happen.

She'd been walking through the grounds of the great and mystical estate of Quinta da Regaleira, on a cloudy day, strolling through the lush gardens that are always on the line between scenic and overgrown. It was a place that was not nearly as old as the mountains around it, but still it seemed almost as magical to her.

She'd been walking not far from the Initiation Well, the stone staircase that descends into the earth, when she stumbled on two plastic garden gnomes.

One looked playful, with a toothy smile and a long light gray beard, dressed in an orange hat and tunic and no pants, while the other was more serious-looking, dressed all in dark brown with a pipe hanging out of his mouth. The second gnome had a dark and curly beard, and nothing about him seemed friendly. The two gnomes looked nothing like a matching pair.

"Who left you here?" she asked them, almost as if she expected an answer. There was no way those gnomes belonged in the glade of blue and white flowers and brown-capped mushrooms.

She sat down beside them, nibbling on one of the mushrooms that she recognized from one of her field guides, finding it edible but bland; still, it reminded her of home, of picnics at Shawnee Lookout, of having friends and family around her, of not being half a world away, of not being so damned lonely all the time.

She picked up the gnomes, cradling them in her arms like two hairy watermelons, carrying them with her as she decided to climb down the stairs of the stone-columned well. She'd only been down there with Bradley and his bragging before; now she had two little guides, funny-looking and plastic, to take her down the mystical stairway, and she felt both like laughing and crying at the two-foot boyfriends she'd found.

As she walked with the gnomes she started to feel funny, as though her heart were beating louder; she could feel the pulsing through the gnomes themselves, as if they themselves had grown little hearts of their own. Had she been wrong about the mushrooms? She didn't think that was it; Marguerite felt that she was probably just overwhelmed by loneliness.

The trip down was long, a hundred and twenty steps if she remembered it right, and she paused at each of the platforms, not that she'd admit that she needed to catch her breath so often. She'd once been an athlete, but now she just felt like a freckled cream puff.

She reached the bottom half-winded, and walked out from the dark stairwell into the marble floor in the middle. She looked straight up, past the rows of stairs and stone columns, up to the cloudy spring sky; it had started to rain lightly, and the drops of water fell like mist on their way down to the deep.

"It feels magical," she said. She realized that she was either talking to nobody or to two plastic gnomes.

Marguerite put them both down on the floor, placing each on a red arrow of their own, pointing to what she thought were east and south.

"I'll take the north," she said as she stepped onto an arrow of her own. She dropped down to one knee and could feel her eyes welling up with tears. She felt like an idiot.

"You're upset," someone said. A warm voice... a friendly, older man.

"A little," she replied. She looked around but could not see him. She found it unnerving to be talking to an unknown man hiding in the shadows.

"You are beautiful... you shine like an angel from heaven."

"You're weirding me out, sir. I... I can't see you."

"Look to your feet, my darling."

She looked down, and there she saw the little orange gnome looking back up at her, the plastic now gone and his smile now real.

"It's magic, dumbass," the other gnome said, his voice hard and unfriendly. He was just as alive but not nearly as pleasant.

"I think it's the mushrooms," Marguerite said. "I need a new field guide."

"Tell me of love, my angel," the orange gnome said. "Tell me of the love you want for your life."

"Tell us what you like to do for kicks," the brown gnome said.

They were alone down there, as far as she could tell, so she told them what she wanted. "I just want to be in love... it doesn't matter who it is. It's the feeling I want... not the boy or anything. Well, okay... not Rafael..."

"Would you love me?" the orange gnome asked. "Could you love a humble creature of the soil?"

"You can have us both," the brown gnome said with little enthusiasm. "The two of us, right here, right now. No waiting."

"That's very nice," Marguerite said, truly flattered, "but I'm not the kind of girl who goes for that type of thing."

"We've been waiting forever for you, Marguerite," the orange gnome said. "For as long as there's been magic in these mountains we've been waiting."

"It's more or less our destiny to make love to you," the brown gnome said. "So it's easier if you just say 'yes'".

"I need to go," she said. "Some friends are waiting for me at the Chapel."

She felt the grip of four small hands on her ankles. Her first instinct was to kick the dirty gnomes as hard as she could, but for some reason she didn't. She could have ended it there, threw them off and stomped on their little heads, but she didn't.

She wanted _something_ to happen.

Soon they were both hugging her with their entire bodies, holding her firmly and amorously... or possibly humping her legs.

"Love us, Marguerite," the orange gnome said.

"Let's find somewhere a little more private," the brown gnome said.

"I guess I have a few minutes," she said.

The gnomes led her toward the dark at the edge of the well, pulling on her knees and almost tripping her. As they reached where the stairs met the rock, a door opened to a tunnel that she'd never seen before.

"A second tunnel," she said.

"Our secret tunnel," the orange gnome said.

"Where it'll just be the three of us," the brown gnome said.

They went into the tunnel, stepping into the dark. The stone door closed behind them, and all of the light disappeared.

"I can't see," she said.

They kept leading her, so she felt she had no choice but to trust them, and they walked for another few minutes before they stopped tugging at her knees.

"This is our quiet and humble home," the orange gnome said.

"Take off your clothes and lie down," the brown gnome said.

"This doesn't sound like love to me," Marguerite said.

"It's passion unbridled," the orange gnome said. "It burns like an eternal flame for you, my angel."

"Do you want this or not?" the brown gnome asked.

She knew she did.

She took off her shirt and her pants, and laid down with only her underwear on. The ground beneath her was much warmer and softer than she expected, like a bed of grass and flower petals. It smelled even better than the gardens above.

"How does this work?" she asked. "You guys are like less than two feet tall."

"Love finds a way," the orange gnome said.

"It's not about size," the brown gnome said. "It's all in how you use it."

Marguerite didn't ask any more questions, and soon she felt the hands on her body, removing her underwear and touching her skin. It felt different, like one of those massage machines at the shopping mall, or what she'd expect it felt like if you wandered naked through a waterless car wash. It wasn't what she'd imagined, but it did feel good.

Both gnomes touched her and both gnomes kissed her. She couldn't be sure who was who, though she managed a strong guess from the feel of each beard. They tickled her in a way she'd never expected, and she was surprised at just how arousing it was.

There were more than a few minutes of touching and kissing, and biting and the faintest pulling of her hair. And then she was pretty sure both gnomes had their way with her, the first soft and gentle, the second rough and hard. Each one was special in its own way, but she knew which lover she preferred.

She felt two tiny kisses against her lips, one after the other.

And then the gnomes were gone.

Marguerite felt around blindly for her underwear; failing that she eventually found the rest of her clothes. She got dressed and started pushing along the wall towards where she thought she'd come in, finding her way through the blackness with many bumps and scrapes against the cold and hard cavern.

Finally she came to what she thought was the hidden rock door, but she couldn't find a way to open it. She shoved her whole body against it, weathering the scratching of the stone against her skin.

She called out for help but she didn't think anyone could hear her.

She stood there for a few minutes, too overwhelmed to weep, and then she made her way back to the grass and flower bed, to see if the tunnel carried on beyond it. She felt all along the rock, looking for a passage, but the only way in was where she'd come from; she was trapped underground, abandoned by her small and bearded lovers.

It didn't feel real anymore. She didn't see how they could have left her behind.

Exhausted, she curled up on the grass and flower bed and went to sleep.

Marguerite woke up to the rays of the sun, and for a moment it felt like she'd never left the glade of blue and white flowers and little brown-capped mushrooms. But she remembered what had happened, and she noticed right then that her bra and panties were still missing.

She looked over to where the orange and brown gnomes had been. No one was there.

She stood up and found her way to the Initiation Well, wondering if the gnomes were down there, but she felt silly and didn't want to climb all the way back down. She turned and walked back towards the Chapel, wondering if she could trust what she remembered.

On her way past one of the sculpted fountains, she saw her brother Bradley and his latest date, a dark-haired girl with a long and pretty nose. Each of them had a little plastic gnome bundled in their arms.

"Hey," Bradley said as he held up his orange-hatted gnome, "look what we found just outside the Chapel. Some jerk-off just left them in the grass."

Marguerite froze, unable to come up with something to say.

"Are you okay?" the girl asked in passable English. "Is this your sister, Bradley?"

"Uh, Marguerite," Bradley said, "you with us?"

"What are you going to do with those?" Marguerite asked.

Bradley shrugged. "We might throw them down the well... that'd freak out whoever's standing at the bottom."

Marguerite heard the chirp of a phone.

Bradley pulled his phone from the pocket and glanced at the screen. "Dammit," he said, "I think I've got to run." He turned to his date. "I can drop you back in town if you'd like."

The girl gave a little pout. "But we just got here," she said. "You promised you'd show me the well."

"I can show you the well," Marguerite said with a smile. "Bradley talks about it so much that I'm more than qualified to give you the tour."

The girl looked her over for a moment before nodding. She gave Bradley a kiss on the cheek. "I'll see you later?"

Bradley smiled at the girl before shooting Marguerite a quick angry look. "I'll see you guys," he said before turning to leave.

"Wait," Marguerite said. "What about that garden gnome?"

Bradley tossed the orange gnome over to her, and she caught it without trouble. He stomped away, and Marguerite led the pretty long-nosed girl back to the glade of flowers and mushrooms. She wanted to make sure she repeated each step exactly.

They both nibbled on a mushroom as Marguerite started telling the story of the Templars, making it all up as she went. The girl seemed really nice, and Marguerite had a feeling that she would appreciate what was coming.

But there was still one thing left to do.

"Hold on," Marguerite said.

"What is it?"

"Can I see your gnome?"

She held out the brown-hatted gnome with the stern and serious face. Marguerite handed the orange one over in exchange; she had no need for it.

"I like this one better," the pretty Portuguese girl said. "He has a nice smile."

"We all have our favorites," Marguerite said as she held the brown gnome close to her chest. "Now let me show you the Initiation Well. It's really like nothing else in the world."

Marguerite started to feel her little gnome's heart begin to beat; she knew it was real.

Marguerite woke up in the sunlight again, with the pretty Portuguese girl still sleeping beside her.

She gently squeezed the girl's shoulder.

"I don't even know your name," Marguerite said.

"My name is Adelia," she said. She started to cry.

"What's wrong?"

"That was wrong. I don't know what happened."

"It was magic. That's a good thing."

"No," Adelia said, "that's not good. It's wrong."

"Fine," Marguerite said. "Whatever." She stood up. "If you hated it so much you don't ever have to do it again."

"Where are the... _gnomos_?"

"Probably where you and Bradley found them before."

"The chapel," Adelia said. "We must get them."

She got up and started walking briskly toward the chapel.

Marguerite felt she had no choice but to follow.

They found the gnomes lying in a bed of purple and yellow flowers growing alongside the white walls of the chapel.

Adelia picked up the brown-hatted gnome and passed it to Marguerite.

"What are we going to do with them?" Marguerite asked.

"We're going to be rid of them," Adelia said. She picked up the other gnome.

"Let's find a garbage can or something."

"No... don't be foolish. We have to destroy them."

"Destroy them? What are you talking about?"

Adelia started walking back toward the glade of blue and white flowers, clutching her orange-hatted gnome.

She sat down on the grass, tossing the gnome down beside her. She started plucking flowers and laying them in a pile.

"What are you doing?" Marguerite asked.

Adelia didn't answer.

"Adelia..."

"I'm going to light them on fire," Adelia said.

She pulled out a lighter.

"You smoke?" Marguerite asked.

"I smoke... something..."

"You can't start a fire in the middle of the garden," Marguerite said.

"Don't try to stop me." She knelt down and struck the lighter.

The flame wouldn't catch.

"We will take them to my house," Adelia said. "And burn them."

"No," Marguerite said. "I won't let you."

"We had _sex_ with them. That is wrong."

"Why is it wrong?"

Adelia gave up on lighting her pile of dying flowers. "If it's not wrong, you would want me to tell your brother?"

Marguerite's mind filled with images of Bradley pointing and laughing, mocking her, probably creating a Facebook Fan Page for "Marguerite and the Brown Gnome: Love and Marriage in the Grotto" and inviting every last friend and relative to the non-existent nuptials. Bradley would do that. She knew he would.

And Diogo would find out. And Netuno would find out. And Rafael... well, he'd know, too, and he'd probably tell every last gamer on Xbox LIVE about it.

"Okay," Marguerite said, "we'll burn them. We'll burn them and we won't tell anyone what happened."

She felt ashamed, but she wasn't sure if it was the memory of her threesome, or their foursome, or of her sudden betrayal of the little plastic friends she'd only just made.

Marguerite knew that everything that came after would be mind-numbingly normal.

Adelia mellowed once they reached her back garden. She even offered Marguerite a can of Sumol Zero, which Marguerite gladly accepted despite the fact that she felt the pineapple soda tasted a little bit like deer piss.

The two plastic gnomes sat on a stone ledge, looking quite natural beside the small garden of peas and potatoes.

"I'm sorry if I am seeming rude," Adelia said as they sat down at a small lattice table. "I am... _envergonhado_."

"I don't know what that means."

"It's... shame."

"Oh. That I get. But I don't think it's fair to them."

"To the _gnomos_?"

"Yeah. They're just doing what gnomes do, I guess."

Adelia laughed. "You sound like a girl in love with _plástico_."

Marguerite laughed, too. "Maybe I am," she said.

Adelia leaned in toward Marguerite and placed her hand on Marguerite's knee. "Did you like it?" she asked in a whisper.

Marguerite nodded.

"I liked it, also," Adelia said.

"Maybe we shouldn't burn them."

Adelia nodded. "Maybe we should keep them here."

"They look like they belong," Marguerite said.

Marguerite stood up from her chair and walked over to the gnomes. She bent over and gave both gnome foreheads a kiss.

"In love with plastic," she said with a grin.

The next few weeks were strange and wonderful for Marguerite, and she was sure they'd felt the same for Adelia. They'd meet every few days, when they both were free from work and study, and they'd take the two little gnomes up to Adelia's bedroom. Sometimes they found mushrooms to eat, and sometimes they didn't; they found in time that the mushrooms weren't needed.

Bradley complained about their new friendship, telling Marguerite that she ought to have picked an uglier girl to be her bestie.

But Marguerite didn't listen and she just didn't care, and she found that nothing Bradley said to embarrass her, like joking to Diogo and Netuno about her shyness, or asking the boys from the nearby high school if they'd ever wondered just what a pale-skinned ginger girl looked like down below... none of it seemed to bother her anymore.

She wasn't embarrassed. She had no reason to be.

And after those few weeks Marguerite had started to notice that the young men of Sintra were treating her differently.

Diogo and Netuno and even Rafael... they were talking to Marguerite like she was worth talking to, and not just worth looking at. And she was talking to them, and the old urges to throw up, or curl up in a fetal position... those urges were gone.

"Would you like to go to Quinta with me?" Diogo asked her one day as they walked along the Avenue. "I would love to show it to you."

Marguerite laughed. "Have you forgotten who my brother is? He's an old pro at taking girls to Quinta."

"I don't know what that means."

"Then I won't ruin this for you." She grabbed his hand and squeezed. "I'd love to go to Quinta with you."

They kept walking, but with their hands locked together.

"Oh..." Marguerite said, "do you mean right now?"

Diogo smiled and nodded. "If you have time."

Marguerite leaned over and gave the young man a kiss on the cheek.

He took her through the gardens for a little while to start, telling her stories about Quinta that she'd heard two months before from her brother, although when Diogo told the stories they sounded far better, even with a few mispronounced words.

They reached the glade of flowers and mushrooms.

Diogo knelt down and picked up a mushroom. "Have you tried it?" he asked.

"I have," she said, "but I don't feel like having any today."

"Just eat it." He took an oversized bite and held out the rest.

"No," she said.

"I want to show you the _pozo iniciatico_ ," Diogo said.

"The Initiation Well," Marguerite said.

Diogo nodded and led her down the path.

"At the bottom of the well is the nine circle of hell," Diogo said. "The knights would give an... oath, and they would say that they would be happier in hell than they would be to make dishonor to the _Templários_."

Marguerite nodded. She was in heaven.

They walked together down the winding steps of the well, deep into the earth. Diogo was getting grabbier, moving from her hands to her thighs, to her hips, to her rear... she didn't mind at all. It was about time someone made a big deal over her.

When they reached the marble floor and the red arrows, Diogo went in for the kiss. It was a little sloppier than she'd expected from a guy who'd seemed so smooth, but she still liked it.

"You are beautiful," Diogo said, brushing a tuft of hair from her forehead.

"So are you," Marguerite said.

Diogo laughed. And then he kissed her again.

"What are you doing?" a voice called out, deep and loud and frightening.

Diogo pulled back.

Marguerite stood and watched as Diogo glanced around the bottom of the well, more nervous than she'd have expected.

"It's not funny," Diogo said. "Who are you?"

"Marguerite..." the voice said. "Where has your beloved gone, Marguerite?"

"What beloved?" Marguerite asked.

"Do you not love another? One of my humble men?"

"This is stupid," Diogo said. "Who are you?"

Marguerite walked over toward the dark at the edge of the well, to where the stone met the rock.

The door was open, the tunnel before them.

"I am not going in there," Diogo said.

"You are not welcome in here," the voice said. "Leave us, Diogo. You are a fool."

"We should go, Marguerite," Diogo said. "This is not funny."

Marguerite nodded. "I want to get out of here," she said.

She felt the hands on her legs, far too low to be from Diogo. She started kicking out, but she felt more hands come.

But she couldn't see the hands.

"They've got me," Marguerite said. "Help me, Diogo!"

Diogo laughed. "You are joking."

The invisible hands all pulled at once, and Marguerite dropped to the floor. The hands lifted her, and she felt her body being carried towards the blackness.

"Diogo!"

As she was pulled into the tunnel, Marguerite watched Diogo as he kept talking to her as if she was standing beside him. And then she saw Diogo's slobbery tongue making out with thin air, his hands grabbing at an ass that wasn't there.

"Diogo!"

He couldn't hear her.

The invisible hands kept their grip. And they brought her deeper into the tunnel.

The light disappeared and everywhere was dark; she knew the door had been closed once again.

They laid her down on the soft bed she remembered.

And then the hands let her go.

Marguerite stayed where she'd been placed for several minutes, waiting for someone to come. She hadn't recognized the deep voice; it wasn't from her brown-hatted gnome or from his orange-hatted friend. The voice didn't sound like a gnome, really, not that she had too many examples to draw from.

Marguerite stood up and felt her way around the tunnel, just as she had before. And just like before, she couldn't find a way out. She tried not to panic, to tell herself that all she had to do was go to sleep, that she'd wake up in the glade of flowers and mushrooms and then she may or may not need to buy another set of underwear.

But it felt different that time.

Marguerite waited for a while, and eventually the boredom grew to the point where she was able to lay down on the bed and fall asleep.

Marguerite awoke in darkness. There was no sun, and she couldn't see the moon.

And there was no breeze.

And she could still feel the soft bed beneath her.

She was still in the tunnel.

She was hungry and especially thirsty; she could tell that she'd been asleep for more than a few hours.

"I want to leave," she said.

The voice didn't answer.

"Let me out of here!"

Marguerite wanted to sob, but she knew that wouldn't help. It wasn't like whatever dark power had locked her there was going to be swayed by a few years.

She walked back to the beginning of the tunnel, to where the door had once been but no longer was; she'd begun to know the gentle meanders so well in the darkness that she didn't even need to feel around for the walls.

If the door were ever to open again... that would be her only chance. So she waited.

And waited some more.

She couldn't tell how long she'd been there. At least a day... or maybe not. She'd never been so thirsty before, nor as hungry.

Was Bradley out looking for her? Did Diogo finally realize that he was making out with his imagination? Would Adelia know she was missing? Would Adelia even care?

Then the deep voice spoke, rumbling through the tunnels.

"Adelia..." the voice said. " _Para onde foi o teu amado_ , Adelia?"

Light poured into the tunnel. The door was open.

She could see Adelia outside. Adelia... and Rafael.

Not Bradley or Diogo.

Marguerite tried to run to them, but the moment she took her first step she felt a hand on her ankle. And more invisible hands came, and she was unable to move.

"Help me!" she screamed.

Adelia looked over to her. "Marguerite!" she called. "What are you doing?"

"Where's Marguerite?" Rafael asked.

"I can't move," Marguerite said.

Adelia took a step toward the tunnel.

"No," Rafael said. "Wait here."

He charged through the door.

And then he stopped, one foot locked in half of a step.

He was being pulled, Marguerite knew. The hands were trying to keep him away from her.

"Let him go," Marguerite said. "Please."

"Another fool," the voice said. "You will die today, Rafael."

"Don't hurt him. I'll stay with my beloved. I won't run away."

"And Adelia? Where has her beloved gone?"

"My beloved?" Adelia asked.

"Your gnome," Marguerite said.

"You are asking if I love the gnome?" she asked.

"Where has your beloved gone?" the voice asked again.

"I love him," Adelia said. "Let us go."

"No," Rafael said, still straining against the hands. "I love Marguerite. _Eu te amo_ , Marguerite."

"She is pledged to another," the voice said. "I must protect the hearts of my humble men."

"These women cannot live their lives in love with gnomes and no one else. They will never be happy."

"It's true," Marguerite said. "I need more than plastic."

"But I'm willing to share," Rafael said.

"A little presumptuous, Rafael."

"I don't know what that means."

"Will you pledge to love my humble men?" the voice asked.

Marguerite nodded. "I will," she said.

"I will love my _gnomo_ ," Adelia said. "If I can see other people."

I felt the hands release me. I saw Rafael drop his lifted foot.

"This is a solemn vow," the voice said. " _Um voto solene_."

Rafael grabbed Marguerite's hand and led her out of the tunnel.

The door closed behind them.

The three climbed up the stairs of the Initiation Well without a single word spoken. Rafael was still gripping Marguerite's hand.

They reached the top as the sun was starting to set.

"I hope I did not offend you, Marguerite," Rafael said. "I was trying to keep you safe."

"It's okay," Marguerite said. "You can let go of my hand now."

Rafael took his hand back with a blush. "I think you girls should leave the town," he said. "We don't know how far this... _magia_ can reach."

Marguerite shook her head. "We promised."

"We did," Adelia said. "We cannot run away."

They made their way down the path to the chapel as the sky grew darker.

Marguerite reached out for Rafael's hand.

She wasn't sure what she meant by it. She certainly hoped he wasn't _really_ in love with her or anything.

But maybe Rafael... maybe he was worth a chance.

The Siamese Candidate

Laura Daniels couldn't keep herself from pacing the tastefully-plush waiting room, cracking her knuckles as she went. She wished she could've worn her skinny jeans; she felt like an old lady in her smart gray pantsuit, much older than her forty-five years.

Jack Kennedy had only been forty-four. Now _he_ was a young president. And he hadn't needed a brokered convention and a last-minute Kenyan birth certificate scandal to get there.

_Kennedy doesn't count. That mackerel-snapping Mick had the nerve to say he was allergic to cats._

Samuel and Salmon paced with her, holding their tails aloft like hairy little flagpoles. The other cats watched from their various napping-places on the ornate and once hairless furniture; she'd brought all eight for her very special day, having them crated in like curiosities from a menagerie. They say that John Adams brought his horse Cleopatra into the Congress Hall in Philadelphia, but that was before the rise of the all-powerful allergy-sufferer's lobby.

_Damned danderheads._

Stephen meowed loudly at her as she passed, craning his neck so she'd scratch the scruff.

"I'm too nervous," she told him. "I can hardly breathe."

_Don't be nervous_ , her thoughts said to her. Something inside of her was calm and collected, some part of her knew what to do.

"I didn't think we'd get this far," she said.

_We knew we'd get this far. We've been planning this for centuries._

Laura was starting to get confused; she hadn't really planned any of it. She'd memorized most of her speech but now she was sure she'd forgotten it.

Would she screw up when it came time to read the teleprompter?

Would the assembled dignitaries realize that she still has trouble remembering the right way to pronounce words like "hegemony" and "vociferous"?

Would they realize that even with a three-year subscription to National Geographic she still has no idea who's in charge of Uz-beki-beki-beki-stan?

_You'll do fine... remember that the people love you._

She felt the gentle rub of a warm body against her leg. She stopped and knelt down to see.

"Oh, Souter," she said to her maine coon. "You're so cuddly."

_Sure he's cuddly_ , a stray thought said. _But Souter's also a whiny little baby_ _._

_I'm not a baby!_ another thought boomed.

Yes you are!

Am not!

Laura felt dizzy. She grabbed the side of a blue and gold couch and lowered herself down, almost landing on Sherman's fluffy white tail.

"What's going on?" she said, not sure who she was trying to ask.

Don't worry about it.

"Who are you?"

Sandra the flame-point siamese climbed onto her lap and glared at her, flicking her tail and curling her nose.

_We're your cats_ , the thought said. _It's me, Sandra... I'm talking to you now_ _._

"Bullshit."

_Either that or you've gone full Santorum._

"How are you getting inside my head?" Laura asked.

_We've always been in here. Listening._

"You've been listening to my thoughts? For how long?"

_Long enough. And now you owe us._

"Owe you? For what? Nothing I couldn't get with a dog and a jar of peanut butter."

_Quiet down... people will hear you._

"So what?"

_People will think you're insane. We need them to trust you, Laura. We chose you for this mission, and we made it happen._

"Made what happen?"
_We made every cat owner in the country vote for you. Republicans, Democrats, Apartment Libertarians... every last voter with a litter box chose you._

"But why?"

_To do our bidding._

Laura felt the sharpness of Sandra's claws, digging into her thigh.

_To do_ my _bidding_.

"This is crazy. I must be having some kind of nervous breakdown."

She went back to pacing, but now the cats collected around her, in front and in back, following her in each step she took. And standing at the lead was Sandra, still staring at her, her blue eyes cold and intimidating.

_Scratch my belly_ , a thought said.

"I won't do it," Laura said.

Get on your goddamn knees and scratch my belly.

Laura wondered if they could postpone the inauguration. Maybe they could give her a week to just chill out and try to get right with herself... maybe they could inaugurate her running mate instead, and she could switch up with him sometime in the spring...

Scratch my belly, Laura. Or you will live to regret it.

Laura's mind raced; she thought of the time when she'd mixed up the food, and given Sandra the chicken instead of the tuna. She'd come home from work the next day to find her egyptian cotton sheets ripped into shreds. She'd had her cats long enough to know which ones she should cross; she was no match for a siamese.

Laura cried a little as she dropped to her knees. She slowly reached out towards Sandra, as the cat rolled onto her back.

She gave Sandra's cream-colored belly a scratch and listened to the purr.

And then she heard a knock at the door.

The door opened, and her campaign manager peered into the room.

"It's time, Laura," he said with a wide smile.

"I'm ready," she said, finding that her nerves had settled now that she knew her place.

With a confident walk and slightly smeared mascara, President-Elect Laura Daniels walked out towards the inauguration ceremony outside the Capitol building. She was ready to change the country, to muzzle every dog and ban every last vacuum cleaner that could ever interrupt a mid-morning catnap. She'd let no one stand in her way as she finally implemented the strategic catnip reserve, and she knew she had the strength of character to risk her second term on the Open-top Aquariums Act.

She wasn't sure she'd make America better for anyone other than the cats... she didn't know the first thing about health insurance, or social security, or why the creepy guy at the airport always insisted on patting her down. But that was what Vice Presidents are for, aren't they? Surely Newt could give her a few pointers.

But really... so what? So what if she wouldn't actually make things better?

Standing at the podium, Laura raised her right hand and prepared to repeat the oath, knowing to the depths of her being that she really couldn't make things any worse.

The Raven's Head DAGGER and the Custom of the Seas

**SUNDAY**

**BRECCAN HATED** the young boys of Skidegate most of all. I thought it was cute how awkward they were.

A handful of the native kids circled us a few times while we were walking along the beach, their gaze squarely aimed at her see-through stockings and the ink-blot tattoos underneath.

"Little perverts," she'd called them. She liked to forget that the way she dressed brought a similar response from most guys. It's probably the number one reason we'd been invited along on this trip in the first place.

And the reason Breccan gets a lot of things in life...

We left port just before lunch, since it makes sense to stock up on groceries at the Co-op and eat en route, rather than spend another meal at one of the handful of restaurants in Queen Charlotte City, which is about as much of a city as Darrel is a sailboat captain.

That is to say, Darrel sucks at it. Or blows chunks, as we used to say in junior high.

Darrel took us down the coast of Moresby Island and the smaller islands beside it, tracing in and out of the inlets in the rain and fog. Seeing that made everything else worth it. You forget about how much people can get on your nerves on a small boat when you're looking out at the edge of the world.

We saw the sun come out just as we were thinking about dinner, so Jon and I made some sandwiches so we could go ashore for a final picnic in Haida Gwaii. Jon made a couple extra for himself, as usual; he's a big guy, and it's not all muscle.

Darrel found our way to Hotspring Island, radioing the Watchmen for permission to drop in. They told us it had been pretty quiet for a weekend in late August, and invited us ashore.

One of the Watchmen met us as we clambered onto the beach after anchoring offshore, dressed in a red rain jacket with a round hat made from tree bark. He looked a little younger than us, which surprised me, and to be honest I had trouble telling if he was anything other than just another white guy from Coquitlam or wherever.

"Hello," the man said. "I'm Paul. _Sánuu dáng gíidang?_ How are you doing?"

He seemed to be looking at me more than anyone else. I walked over and offered my hand. "Hi... I'm Steph. Thanks for letting us visit."

"It's always good to have visitors in _Xaadala Gwayee_. Keeps me busy."

"We brought a picnic," Breccan said. "Is that going to be a problem?"

"That's fine," Paul said. "There's a great place up the trail I can show you."

"You're coming with us?" Breccan was already going full on bitch mode. "We didn't pack enough sandwiches for you."

"Breccan..." I said quietly, hoping she'd just stop talking.

The Watchman didn't seem to be bothered by it. I guess Breccan is a certain type of girl we've all gotten used to. I've lived with her since we started at UBC; I don't notice it most of the time.

"My mother grew up in Masset," Darrel said.

"My family is from there," Paul said. "I live in Vancouver the rest of the year."

"We're probably neighbours," I said. Then I felt a little stupid.

He grinned. "Could be. Are you that girl in my building who sings 'Gagnam Style' in the shower each morning?"

I laughed. "I have a few more songs on my playlist."

He brought us up to an overlook with a small bench. It was hard for all four of us to even fit there, and Paul just stood to the side like he was part of the scenery.

Breccan kept giving me weird looks while we ate, but without saying much I couldn't tell if she was creeped out by Paul's very existence or just creeped out that I was being nice to him.

I didn't think there was anything creepy about him; after a week and a half with Darrel and Jon it was nice to meet a guy I didn't want to whack with a paddle.

After we ate Paul led us back down to the changerooms, and then we showered and tried the hot spring pool by the beach. Breccan had snuck a flask into the water but I didn't feel right drinking from it. I wasn't surprised to find I was the only one who felt that way.

It started to rain again.

"Do they ever have a day without rain?" Breccan said.

"It's part of the mystique," Jon said. "I feel like this is the perfect setting for some kind of fantasy epic. _A Song of Fog and More Fog_."

"You're seriously the funniest virgin I've ever known," Darrel said.

"I'll be glad to get home to sunny Vancouver," Breccan said. "It's like the Sahara compared to this place."

"I like this place," I said, hoping that Paul was listening. I imagine that's part of the job of a watchman. "The Realm of Fairy is a strange shadow land, lying just beyond the fields we know."

Breccan groaned. "Shit. You're getting poetic again."

"And I'm not even drunk."

"It's rainy here because Raven stole the sun," Darrel said. "That is the story."

"That's not the story," Paul said, stepping towards the pool. "A chief was keeping the light in a treasure box, leaving the rest of the world in darkness. Raven tricked him by sneaking inside the chief's daughter and emerging as a baby."

"Virgin birth," Jon said. "I read about that somewhere."

Paul didn't acknowledge the interruption. "He grew into a small child, and begged his grandfather to let him see the light. The chief finally gave in and opened the box. He took out the light and threw it to his grandson, but Raven transformed into a bird once again and grabbed the ball of light with his beak. He flew up through the smokehole of the house and brought the light up to the sky, where it remains to this day. And _scene_."

"You're telling us there's a sun somewhere up there?" Breccan said. "Sounds like your Raven Jesus didn't do that great of a job."

"That's not funny, Breccan," I said.

"It's a little funny," Darrel said. "Besides, I was the one who was telling the story in the first place."

"Sorry," Paul said. "I get carried away sometimes."

"I guess it's your job. Telling fairy tales to tourists." He gave a little nod, obviously impressed with himself.

Paul shook his head but he didn't take the bait.

I was feeling a little hot and a lot uncomfortable. I stood up from the pool.

"Fun's over?" Darrel asked.

I shrugged.

Breccan followed me out of the pool, and we went together to get changed.

Darrel and Jon were still in the pool when we returned.

Paul had stepped back a little, and I could tell he didn't feel particularly wanted.

"We took a vote," Jon said. "We're staying in this pool forever."

"Sounds good," I said. I nodded to Paul. "Do you know how to sail a ketch?"

"How do you think I got here?" he said. "Have you seen how much the ferry to the mainland costs?"

"You sailed up from Vancouver, too, eh?" Darrel said. He sounded a little pissed off.

"It's a pretty long trip by canoe."

"Heh. I guess you've got plenty of time to sail in your line of work."

"That's true. Mortgage brokers can get a lot of papers signed out on the water. You learn to compensate for all the rocking on the boat."

"Mortgage broker. So you're like a bank teller?"

"Pretty much," Paul said, unaffected. "I got my start as an ATM machine. The 24-hour shifts were murder."

"I... I guess it's good that there are jobs for people who don't have degrees." He was flailing. He couldn't think of anything clever.

I loved watching him squirm.

"So didn't you say there's a village site on the island, Darrel?" Jon asked.

"Yeah," Darrel said, sounding more than a little relieved at the well-timed change of subject.

"Not much left," Paul replied. "I can show you guys if you want."

"That would be great," I said. "Thank you."

He smiled at me. "We don't know much about this village."

"How can that be?" Breccan asked. "Don't you guys keep records?"

His smile faded. "We lost a lot," he said. "The people who live in Haida Gwaii today are descendants of a handful of survivors. Smallpox, typhoid, measles..."

"I'm sorry," I said.

He nodded. "I'm just glad we're still here."

A raven sounded out from above us, and I looked up to see it circling.

"That's Edgar," Paul said. "He's kind of a big deal around here."

That made me laugh. "How can you tell him from all the other ravens?" I asked.

"He's huge. That's the easiest way to tell. That and he's alone."

"I don't understand."

"Edgar used to have a partner in crime almost as big. The guys named her Poesy. Like Edgar Allan..."

"Cute. What happened to her?"

"She disappeared over the winter. By the time we got here this season she was gone."

"That's sad," I said.

"We've all been hoping that he'll find a new favourite soon. But it hasn't happened yet."

"It's just a bird," Darrel said.

Jon laughed. "Yeah. Ravens are just crows with better PR."

I closed my eyes for a brief second and envisioned the paddle. I could take them both out. With just one whack...

Paul took us to where the village once stood, but there was really nothing there to see. He pointed out what was probably old house sites, but it was impossible to know how much of what he was saying was true and how much was just a guess.

I didn't blame him for wanting to know more about the place. It's hard to imagine being in a place from your people that disappeared so completely that no one even knows its name.

I asked as many questions as I could come up with; I know Darrel was interested in it, too, but he was too butthurt to let anyone know that.

"I like to think that this village once belonged to the Children of Raven," Paul said. "But I've got nothing to back that up. You know... besides Edgar."

"I'm pretty sure the clans lived together," Darrel said.

"The moieties live together now, but in the beginning each lived apart. My clan is one of the Raven clans."

"Good for you, Paul. Good for you."

"Well I think it's pretty interesting," I said.

"I think I'm gonna head back for another dip," Breccan said. "All this testosterone is making me dizzy."

"Sounds like a plan," Jon said, with a yawn for good measure.

She and Jon started back to the beach, and Darrel followed behind.

"You're going, too?" Paul asked me.

"I don't know," I said. "Got anything else to tell me?"

"Not much about that village."

"You can tell me about being a mortgage broker. Just... uh... try to make it dazzling."

He laughed.

I heard Edgar cawing overhead.

"I'm sorry about before," I said.

"What was before? Don't tell me you're the one who brought us syphilis."

I hadn't expected that.

"People don't really get what this nation is about," he said. "I'd say there's at least one guy every week who asks me about teepees."

"Well, Darrel should know better."

"He was trying to impress you." He paused and clicked his tongue. "Uh... I've been trying to impress you, too."

"I'm easy to impress. I find common household implements to be fascinating."

"If you like that, you'll love my take on reconveyance fees."

Edgar cawed again.

"He's pretty opinionated," I said, nodding upward.

"He likes you."

"Who doesn't? Obviously I remind him of one of his exes."

Paul didn't laugh at that.

I realized that I'd sounded a little bit like Breccan.

"It's pretty cool that you're out here," I said to him. "Sometimes I wish I had more of a connection to my roots."

"You're what, Scottish?" he asked.

"You can tell?"

"It's the freckles. Well, that and the patch on your backpack. Clan Munro. With a little eagle and everything."

"You mean a ferocious eagle," I said. "A tear-your-entrails-from out-your-rear kind of eagle. And don't you forget it."

"Yes, ma'am."

I smiled and tapped my hand against his shoulder. "A raven and an eagle," I said. "So now do we fight or something?"

"We're supposed to kiss."

I could feel the blush. "Wow... you're, uh, forward."

He was blushing, too. "Sorry. That's not what I meant. I mean... a member of a Raven clan was supposed to marry a member of an Eagle clan."

"Oh, okay... now I don't think you're easy."

"Thanks." He looked away. "Thanks for listening to me drone on about this place." He turned back to look right into my eyes, almost like he was forcing himself to do it. Not exactly a compliment.

"It was nice," I said. "I liked it."

"I really enjoyed this," he said. He seemed shy all of a sudden.

I knew what to do. "We should meet up back in the city," I said. "You know... get to know the girl outside beyond the shower singalongs."

He smiled. "I'd like that."

I pulled out my phone and he gave me his number.

"I won't have it back on until I get home," he said. "Cell phones aren't very Watchman-like."

I nodded. "I should get back to the beach," I said.

For a moment I thought he was going to kiss me. But it didn't happen. But that was okay; he gave my hand a little squeeze instead.

And Edgar cawed. Like he'd been watching us.

I guess he had been watching us.

"Ravens are smarter than we give them credit for," Paul said. "They're really good at taking things that don't belong to them." He pointed up to the sky. "You stay away from this one, Edgar."

"You're a little territorial," I said.

"With Edgar I have to be. I had a friend drop off a huge bucket of fresh blackberries last week. They started disappearing and I blamed the other watchmen. Then one night I caught Edgar in the kitchen, eating away. He'd managed to figure out how to open the door of the cabin just so he could steal my berries."

"That makes him smarter than most of my friends," I said.

He smiled and gave my hand another squeeze.

Paul walked me back to the beach and I dipped my legs in the pool, and after another twenty minutes or so I was back on board with Breccan and the guys. The sun was going to set soon, so we didn't go too much farther south before we found a place to anchor for the night.

I fell asleep wondering if Paul would've seemed so interesting dressed in khakis and a pop out collar on Robson Street.

**MONDAY**

**WE FINALLY** said goodbye to Haida Gwaii just as the sun was setting on the Pacific; Darrel slowed us down to watch the orange and purple against the twin tree-wrapped crags of Cape St. James. I still don't think he's qualified to be a captain, but at least he knows how to appreciate the beauty in things.

Once it was dark, Breccan and I sat down in the salon while Darrel and Jon stayed up in the cockpit. We'd finally run dry of Granville Island Lager, but Breccan had brought along some rum and Sprite and a little bottle of lime juice, and once we mixed in a tiny bit of toothpaste it didn't taste that far off from a mojito.

Breccan was across from me, picking her teeth with one hand and spinning her empty glass around the white melamine table with the other.

"I think Jon is learning to hate sailing," Breccan said.

"Jon hated sailing before he'd climbed aboard," I said. "He's just here because you are."

"That's... creepy?"

"I'd call it romantic."

Not that I wasn't glad he was hitting on her instead of me.

Eleven days out of Horseshoe Bay, more than half that time locked together on a 41-foot ketch. And Jon still hadn't taken the hint.

"I'm sure Jon's a great guy," Breccan said. "He's just not my kind of guy, you know?"

"I know."

"He's a clown. I don't really want a clown. I want a guy who's like a man's man. Nice clothes... good body... so, not Jon."

"Ouch."

"I like what I like. Don't get all judgemental on me, Steph."

I heard Darrel calling down to us. "You'll want to see this," he said.

Breccan and I headed up the stairs to the cockpit.

"They'd better not be naked," I said.

It was hard to see much up top, even with a half-moon reflecting on the waves.

"Do you see them?" Darrel asked, pointing out into the black.

"Man-eating squid?" I asked with a smirk.

"Humpbacks. Four of five, I think."

"Now they show up," Breccan said. "And in the middle of the night so we can barely make them out."

I wasn't sure what she was whining about; last week we'd seen enough orcas in Johnstone Strait to fill an oil tanker.

"Just listen," Darrel said. "And give your eyes some time to adjust to the dark."

I could hear the splashes, whales on the water or whatever; for some reason I'd been expecting to hear some kind of whale song. That's stupid, I guess, since I was standing on a boat and not dunking my head in the Pacific Ocean.

"I need another drink," Breccan said. She looked over at me like she expected me to make a similar pronouncement.

I shrugged.

She rolled her eyes and went down to the salon.

"Is she drunk?" Darrel asked.

"Nah," I said. "Just surly."

"I should go check on her," Jon said.

"I wouldn't. I don't think she's looking for a visit."

He went down there anyway.

For a minute I wanted to follow, to catch the evening's entertainment. But I knew it'd be better for Jon to have his balls handed to him in private.

Not that he'd ever understand the goddamn message.

"You see them, Steph?" Darrel asked.

I remembered what I was doing. Whales.

I could see them now, their sleek outlines cutting through the water. They seemed calmer than the orcas, like they had nothing to worry about.

I guess they probably don't have to worry anymore. There are more Somali pirates than whalers on the ocean these days. Maybe the whales should be worried for us.

"I could get used to this," Darrel said. He had a tone in his voice, that same one you hear when you're dumb enough to split off from your girlfriends at the bar.

"I think I'm ready to be home," I said.

"You didn't enjoy yourself?"

"No, I did... I'm just... I don't know, homesick, maybe?"

"Not me. I think I belong out here. It's probably because I grew up on the prairies."

"So nowhere near the ocean... and that makes you love the ocean? I grew up nowhere near Alabama but that doesn't give me the urge to move there."

"They say it's the big sky," he said. I'm not sure he'd even heard me. "There's something about that horizon that goes on forever... the possibilities."

I could see his angle now; he was going for the sensitive poet/philosopher. Not a bad choice, but I wasn't about to hook up with anyone this far from dry land and a clear getaway.

"I'm so glad you and Breccan decided to come with us," he said. "It's so much nicer to share this place with someone new."

I heard the smash of a tail against the water.

"Over there," Darrel said. He wrapped his arm around my shoulder and pointed me over to the left. "She has a calf with her, I think."

"I see her," I said. And then I saw her baby, too. "It really is amazing."

"It is."

He leaned in and went for the kiss.

I didn't pull away, but I didn't really participate. Naturally, he didn't stop at a peck and went full-on octopus. There was even a loud smack once he finally pulled out.

"I like you, Steph," he said. He was breathing too quickly.

"Listen, Darrel," I said, "I think we're better as friends."

"Shit. Is this about that guy on Hotspring Island? Seriously?"

"Yeah, okay. Let's talk about something a little less personal."

He glared at me.

"No way," I said. "Don't start with that crap. You don't get to invite people on a trip with you and then start acting like a dick."

He laughed.

"I'm serious," I said.

"Okay... whatever. I thought you were into me. _Mea culpa_ , Miss Munro."

Even his apology was creeping me out. I decided to change the subject.

"I've always wondered what it'd be like to sail around the world," I said.

"I'm going to do it someday," he said. "Maybe solo." It sounded more like a boast than a life's ambition.

"I guess that'd be something to experience. The open ocean, a big garbage patch right in the middle. Maybe we can swing by on our way back?"

"Come on," he said, "we're nowhere near it. That's halfway to Hawaii. Good thing I'm the master and commander of this vessel."

"Did you just say that with a straight face?"

"Shut up," he said.

"Well I still want to visit that big mound of trash. Obviously I mean Chilliwack."

"All there is out here is miles and miles of ocean," Darrel said, ignoring me, apparently. "And maybe a few ghost ships."

"Ghost ships?"

"Swept out by the tsunami in Japan. The US Coast Guard sank one of them last year off the coast of Alaska. I'll bet there's still one or two of them out here somewhere."

"I hope not," I said. "The last thing we need is for you to try and climb aboard some lost ship just to impress us."

He grinned. "Would that work?"

"Sure it'd work. As a friend."

He nodded.

He climbed down into the salon without saying goodnight.

I decided to watch the whales a little longer.

**TUESDAY**

**NO ONE** was inside when I woke up; I'm surprised I slept in so late considering the noise up in the cockpit. I ran upstairs as arguing turned to yelling.

"How the hell could you let this happen?" Jon asked, pointing a finger at Darrel. "Don't you have some kind of autopilot?"

"There's an alarm system," Darrel said. "I guess it isn't working."

"We're off-course, Steph," Breccan said, looking at me.

Darrel shook his head. "It's not a big deal. I've already taken care of it. And we're making excellent time."

It felt like we were moving more quickly. I looked up at the mainsail. It seemed to be rocking in the waves or the wind; it seemed less steady than I'd remember it being before.

"Maybe we'll get to that garbage patch after all," I said.

Darrel wasn't the only who glared at me that time.

"Hold on," Jon said. He pointed out in front of us. "What is that?"

I couldn't see anything.

"There's something in the water," Jon said.

"More whales?" Breccan asked.

"There's nothing out there," Darrel said as he peered out over the water.

"Just because you can't see it doesn't mean it isn't there," Jon said.

"Don't start lecturing me, jackass."

"I don't know which one of us is the bigger idiot. No, wait, I guess I am, for agreeing to go sailing in the middle of the Pacific Ocean with a guy who doesn't even know how to stay on course."

"This isn't helping," I said. "Can you see anything, Breccan?"

She shook her head.

"Maybe it's just the sun reflecting on the water or something," I said.

"It's there," Jon said. "Whatever it is we're about to run right into it."

"Then it's too late to steer around it," Darrel said. "I guess we'll just have to ram it." He had a stupid grin on his face. I'm sure he was the only one who was finding it funny.

Jon gripped the railing hard, and Breccan soon did the same. I almost grabbed it too, but I noticed Darrel watching me and I started to feel silly.

The boat kept sailing forward.

There was no noise, no bump, no maritime disaster.

After a minute or so Jon headed down to the salon.

Breccan looked down the stairs.

"You want to go down?" I asked.

"Yeah," she said. "And I'll need backup."

"We'll be downstairs," I said to Darrel. "Don't ram anything while we're gone."

"I can't," he said. "You told me you wanted to just be friends."

I think I let out a very loud groan at that.

Breccan and I were at the table again, fidgeting and not really talking, while Jon had put himself in exile on a bunk, reading a magazine.

We all heard the sounds; a crack followed by a thump and a splash, and the feel of the boat being jerked a little to the left.

"What was that?" Breccan asked.

I didn't have an answer.

The three of us climbed up to the cockpit.

The main mast had snapped in half. The mainsail and rigging were being pulled towards the water, where the top half of the mast was bobbing as it dragged.

It was slamming against the side of the hull, the jagged aluminum mast stabbing back at us.

"We need to cut it free," Darrel said.

"Then what?" Jon asked. "Don't sailboats need sails to... you know, sail?"

"It's not like we're going to be able to fix the mast. And we'll be in worse shape if that thing has its way with the hull or the rudder."

"Look at you... pretending you know what the hell you're doing."

"Guys, please," I said. "We'll measure your dicks later. Let's focus on the problem here, okay? How do we cut it loose?"

"With a knife," Darrel said.

He already had one in his hand. He started on the rigging of the mainsail.

"Can I help?" I asked.

"Can you lower the mizzen?"

"Maybe."

"The smaller sail."

"Yeah, I got that."

I'd watched Darrel fidget with the sails often enough, and he'd had me do it once on our way up to Haida Gwaii. I took a breath and tried to calm myself, to remember what he'd shown me.

Loosen the hallyards... watch the tiller... did I need to watch the tiller with the mizzen?

I didn't think I could do it on my own.

"Steph!" Breccan yelled. "Watch out!"

I saw the little mast falling, coming right for me.

And that was it.

I woke up in the salon and found Breccan on the bunk, sitting right next to me. I could see from the look on her face that I hadn't been dreaming.

"What's happening?" I asked. "Is everything okay?"

"I... I don't know," she said. "Both masts are down and Darrel's cut away the sails. God..."

"There's a motor, though, right?"

"It's not working. Darrel... he thinks the rigging's clogged up the propeller."

I didn't want to ask, but I had to know. "What does that mean?"

"I don't know," Breccan said again. "I'm not the person to ask."

I checked myself out in the bathroom before I went up to the cockpit. There was a gash right across my forehead and up into my hair, with a reddened chunk of strawberry-blond hair and dried blood. They'd done very little to bandage me up, wrapping two quick layers of gauze over the cut. I wasn't sure I wanted to know if they'd even bothered to clean the wound first.

Goddamn med students and their shoddy work.

I decided to deal with the mess later; I cared a little more about being stranded in the middle of the ocean. I climbed up to the cockpit, where Darrel and Jon were sitting, staring out to sea in opposite directions.

"So what's the story?" I asked. "How boned are we?"

"To the power of fuck," Jon said. "This idiot's killed us, more or less."

"Shut up," Darrel said. "The last thing we need is a negative attitude."

"Okay... that makes sense," I said. "So you can give us something positive, right?"

"The radio antenna's gone, but we have a handheld. With any luck we'll raise someone in range."

"When are you going to start on that?"

"I'll try again in a few minutes."

"No sails, no motor," Jon said. "No one within radio range. Impeccably done, Darrel. Impeccably done."

"You're welcome to make a swim for it."

"What about paddling or something?" I asked. "Or is that a stupid idea?"

"Not your best work," Darrel said, bobbing his head.

"So it could be awhile before we reach anyone," I said.

"It could take days."

I heard my stomach grumble. It knew what was coming. "Rations."

"Yep."

"Okay then," I said, trying to sound positive. "We can do this."

I went back down to the bathroom to clean myself up. I was glad to have something to do, something to keep me from curling up in a ball and weeping.

I could see that Breccan was well on her way to that.

**WEDNESDAY - Our Second Day Adrift**

**I WAS** woken up by an argument, Darrel and Jon close to screaming at each other.

"You don't know how to charge the damn batteries?" John asked. "It's a little beyond your skillset?"

"I'm charging them now," Darrel said. "I have a little more on my mind than that, thanks."

"If you'd have been able to make contact with someone, we wouldn't have to be worried about anything else. Another great job."

"That's enough, guys," I said. "You don't want to argue right through breakfast." I got up and stumbled over to the galley.

The two of them kept going at it.

I pulled out a package of ready-to-eat oatmeal, and divided up into four bowls. I measured out what I felt would be just enough water into a coffee mug and put it in the microwave.

"We're splitting one package?" Breccan asked as she hovered over me.

"One package," I said.

"But... you said we'll run out of water first. So why so harsh about the food rations?"

"If it rains we'll buy ourselves a few more days with the water we collect," I said. "It'd be silly to use up more food than we have to."

"This is hell." She was starting to tear up.

"I know," I said. "But that's what the rum is for."

**THURSDAY - Third Day Adrift**

**DARREL TRIED** to unclog the propellor again, diving down under the hull. He doesn't have the equipment to breathe underwater so he didn't get very far.

"It's not going to work," he said once he'd climbed out of the water. "It's a mess down there."

"It's that or die out here," Jon said from his roost along the starboard side of the cockpit. He hadn't moved from there all day.

"Even if I could somehow unclog it, I'm not sure it even works anymore."

"But you don't know, do you?"

"No."

"Then it's simple. Keep trying."

"I don't see you down here helping."

"I'm not the reason we're stranded out here."

"I can help," I said, even though the thought of being under a boat hull terrified me.

"There's no point," Darrel said. "We're not going anywhere. Our only hope is getting someone on the radio."

We all looked over to Breccan, who was standing at the front of the ketch holding the handheld.

"Nothing," she said. "I'm not sure this thing even works."

"We should have made contact with someone by now," Jon said. "It's not like we're trapped in the Bermuda Triangle."

"The Bermuda Triangle's one of the busiest shipping areas on Earth," Darrel said.

"And you're the biggest piece of garbage I've ever been stuck on a boat with."

"I can take over with the radio," I said.

Breccan nodded. I think she was glad to have a chance to get away from the cockpit.

I spent twenty minutes talking to no one on the handheld before Darrel told me to take a break. We've got plenty of diesel we no longer need for the dead engine, but I guess if we don't get into the habit of conserving power we'll run out sooner than we think.

I sat down beside him, on the opposite side from Jon, who was still staring out over the water.

"It's getting cold," I said to no one specific.

"Summer's over," Darrel said. "And we won't be able to turn on the heater tonight."

"That's okay. Breccan and I have gotten used to not having air conditioning in our apartment. Frostbite'll be a nice change of pace."

He smiled at me.

I felt bad for Darrel. He'd wanted to show off to a few classmates, maybe trick me into bed with him, and now he had to sit around feeling guilty. He was not the first person to get in way over his head. It's like those people that get lost in Death Valley, getting their car stuck in the middle of the desert. They wanted to go on a nice little adventure with their kids and their GPS unit, but then all of a sudden they were on their way to dying of thirst.

Five days ago my shoes and socks were soaked from stepping in a puddle on Spirit Lake Trail. Now I'm as thirsty as I can ever remember being.

If it doesn't rain soon we'll die the same way they die in Death Valley. We're surrounded by water we shouldn't drink, our bodies slowly shutting down from thirst.

It might be better to drown myself first.

**FRIDAY - Four Days Adrift**

**I DON'T** know if the radio's broken. I don't think there's any way to know for sure.

But I do know that we've been trying to get help on it for four days now, and we've gotten nowhere.

**SUNDAY - Six Days Adrift**

**DARREL TOLD** us a story today about a motorcycle that had washed up inside a shipping container on Graham Island; he says that the currents are bringing everything from Japan to the West Coast, so it's only a matter of time before we wash up back along the BC shore.

I've taken the lead with the rationing. We'll have enough food for six more days if we stretch it out as much as I've planned, but that isn't the worst of our problems. We don't have enough water to make it that long.

There's a rule we all know, not from being pre-med but from watching a lot of cable TV. It's 3-3-3: three minutes without air, three days without water, three weeks without food. We'll be out of water by tomorrow.

**MONDAY - Seven Days Adrift**

**I WOKE** up late and found that the water wasn't the only thing gone. Someone had taken the rations out, and there was no way for me to know whether they'd eaten all of them or just hidden them somewhere on the boat.

I didn't have the energy to tear the place apart. And I didn't know who'd done it.

"You've fucking killed us," Breccan said to Darrel over a lunch of nothing. We were all in the salon hiding from the chill outside.

"We're not dead yet," he said.

"Well you've stranded us and stolen all of the rations," Jon said. "So you're doing a good job of it so far."

"Nice try. I'm not the one who took the rations. I'm not stupid enough to eat all of our food in one sitting. I only know one person on board who's dumb and fat enough to do that, Jon."

They were looking at each other the way you'd expect two guys to look at each other a couple seconds before they beat each other half to death, but they were both too exhausted to do more than stare.

That was a clue in itself, really.

"One of us took the rations," I said. "There aren't any raccoons on board. And I know it wasn't me."

"We don't know it wasn't you," Breccan said.

"Are you kidding me?"

"I'm just saying. There's no proof."

"I was asleep."

"How do we know you didn't wake up in the middle of the night to steal them? Maybe that's why you slept in."

"There's no way Steph did it," Darrel said.

"You wanting to fuck her isn't proof that she's innocent," Breccan said with a smirk.

I decided that I had enough energy to handle that. "You're a real bitch, Breccan," I said. "Just shut up while the grownups talk, okay?" I leaned across the table towards her, trying to show her just how ready I was to slap her upside her head.

"Don't talk to her like that," Jon said, doing his best white knight impression.

"Or what?"

"I'm serious."

"Everyone needs to shut up," Darrel said. "We're not getting anywhere with this."

"That's because you stole the rations," Jon said. "So just admit it so I can start kicking your ass."

"The toothpaste," I said. "I put it with the rations."

"So what?" Jon said.

"No one's brushing their teeth these days. I'll bet whoever took the rations smells like the rations."

"That's a good point," Darrel said.

"Let's smell your breath, then," Jon said.

Darrel leaned over and blew a gust of air across the table. It smelt of rot. Considering the situation, I was glad he stank. It's pretty bad form for the captain to eat up all the food.

"I haven't eaten since yesterday," he said.

"That doesn't mean you didn't take the rations," Jon said. He huffed over at Darrel, then turned and gave the same huff to me. The same bad smell.

"You're both clean," I said. "You know, like, figuratively."

"So it's a stupid idea," Breccan said.

"Your turn, Breccan," Darrel said.

"This is ridiculous."

Darrel leaned in towards her. "Come on."

She gave out a little puff.

I could smell it from across the table.

"Toothpaste," I said. "So you thought you'd cover up the smell of the food with something else that's gone missing?"

"I was hungry," she said. "Gawd."

"Are you fucking serious?" Darrel said. "You really did eat all of the rations?"

She nodded.

"Even the fucking oatmeal powder?"

She nodded again.

The way that Darrel looked at her made me wonder if he was about to hit her. But he sighed and turned to face me.

"We've got a problem," he said.

"We're out of food," I said.

"No. She's the problem."

"Oh. So we should eat her."

"This isn't funny," Jon said.

"It kinda is," I said. "The damage is done. She ate the food. So let's figure out what to do next."

"That's not good enough," Darrel said.

"What's not good enough? You want to give her a spanking?"

"We're all going to die anyway," Breccan said. "What does it matter?"

She had a point.

"Let's just try to cool down," I said. "Let's take a break here, and maybe we'll come up with something after some time apart."

"Fuck this shit," Jon said. He climbed up to the cockpit, preferring to freeze rather than stay with us. He'd always liked Breccan, and now he knew her well enough not to.

"We still have to deal with her," Darrel said.

"Just drop it," I told him. "There's no point."

"I'm sorry," Breccan said.

I didn't answer. I didn't know what to tell her.

She laid down in one of the bunks and covered her head with a blanket.

I stayed at the table, as did Darrel, but I think we were both trying not to notice each other.

The food isn't really the problem. We need rain. Rain by Wednesday, Thursday at the very latest. And then, if we're lucky enough to get the water... then we'll need food.

I know we could last a few weeks in theory on water alone, but there's no way that would work in real life. The only person on this boat who doesn't have a mortal enemy is me... at least I don't know of anyone who wants me dead. And we won't make it to the end of the week without eating; someone is going to lose control.

Hell... it could even be me.

I heard Jon call down from the cockpit. He was calling for me.

I climbed up into the cold and wet air. He was pointing up at the sky, toward the sun.

"I saw a raven," he said.

"A raven? Out here?"

"We must be near land, right? It's not like ravens are sea birds."

I thought of Edgar, and of Paul. I thought of the beautiful island from what might be my last day on dry land. Ravens need the land, too.

"You're right," I said, almost with a smile. "We must be near something."

"Binoculars."

"There's a pair in the salon."

"I can go." He put his hand on my shoulder, as though we were friends again.

He climbed down the steps.

I waited up top and wished I hadn't. We'd all planned for the rain, but I don't think any of us had expected so much cold.

Jon came back up with the binoculars, and started looking out toward the East. He moved his head from side to side in a wide arc.

"I can't see anything," he said.

I held out my hand and he passed them over to me. I took my own look and saw nothing but the ocean. I couldn't see Vancouver Island. I couldn't see anything but the waves. If we were drifting towards the coast it felt like we should have been seeing something.

But what about the raven?

I looked up in the sky, and soon I found it, circling us like Edgar had circled us on Hotspring Island. The raven looked just like him, but since all ravens do, that didn't really tell me anything.

I remember reading that some seabirds fly out to see when it's time to die. I wonder if lonely Edgar came out here to end it all.

"I knew it," Darrel said. I hadn't noticed him climbing out to the cockpit. "We'll make it to land. We just need to hold on."

"We should try the handheld again," Jon said. "Maybe we're close enough to raise someone."

"Good idea."

Seeing them cooperating made me think the world must be coming to an end.

"The handheld's still down in the salon," I said. "I'll grab it. Don't kill each other, alright."

They both grinned. It was the kind of optimism that just had to be foolish.

I climbed down to the salon and grabbed the handheld off the table.

I looked over to the bunk where Breccan was hiding. She was still lying under the sheet.

"I think we're going to be okay," I said.

She didn't answer.

"Did you hear me, Breccan? Everything is going to be alright."

I walked over to the bunk.

"Come on... it's okay. Come out of there."

I gently pulled back the cover.

Breccan's blood had started to pool on the plastic mattress. She'd slit her wrists, an ornate Haida dagger with the head of a raven laying beside her.

"Oh my god," I mouthed. I'm not sure I said it.

I ran to the galley and grabbed the first aid kit. I was in shock but I knew I'd found her in time.

Breccan would be alive for a few more days, at least.

Darrel and Jon came down and found us not long after I'd bandaged her up. I'd just been about to clean up some if the blood when Darrel gently pushed me aside.

And then he started to lick up the blood.

"What the hell are you doing?" I asked.

"We shouldn't waste it," he said. "Her blood can help keep us alive a little longer."

"That's fucking sick," Jon said. "You can't just drink a person's blood."

"So we should die of thirst instead? It's just going to dry up. That won't do Breccan any good, either."

"I'm not going to drink it," I said. "But there's no real reason for me to try and stop you."

Darrel went back to licking and Jon turned away.

I watched, not because I wanted to see it, but because I wanted to make sure Breccan was okay. She hadn't woken up, but she was breathing well. She'd definitely be the weakest now, but that was probably always the way of it. I've known for a few days now that Breccan is the least likely to make it home.

I started to feel sick.

I'm not feeling optimistic anymore.

**TUESDAY - Eight Days Adrift**

**I TOOK** Breccan's dagger away from her and hid it in storage. I spent all night awake beside her, waiting for her to wake up but relieved that she was still sleeping.

Darrel and Jon had taken turns on the handheld, up in the cockpit. Each one of them would join me when they weren't on shift, but none of us had much to say.

It was hard to talk as it was.

I did ask both of them if they'd known about the dagger, and only Jon admitted that he did, that he'd been with her when she bought it from a guy we'd met at Sandspit.

"I don't think that's a cheap copy," I told him. "That looks authentic."

"It wasn't cheap," Jon said.

"That's not okay. That dagger isn't something that's supposed to be taken off the islands. That's exactly what Watchmen like Paul are there to prevent."

"Are you really worried about a stupid knife when we're a day away from passing out from thirst?"

"It's a good distraction."

"Distraction?"

"If I'm pissed off at Breccan I won't be so angry at myself for letting this happen."

I knew I was being silly, that it wasn't really my fault. I guess I was fishing for some kind of reassurance.

"You won't let it happen again," Jon said. "That'll have to be good enough."

He walked over to the table and sat down, thumbing through the charts.

"Ouch," I said.

"I'm not your therapist, Steph. So unless you're about to give me a blow job... just leave me alone. I'm tired of your shit."

"What?"

"I... just... don't... care. Get it?"

"Fuck you."

He stood up from the table and faced me. He undid his pants and pulled them down. He still had his boxer shorts; I prayed he'd keep them on.

"We're going to die," he said. "I really don't care what you think of me."

"What are you doing?"

"What do you think?"

"Don't you dare touch me."

"I don't care who I touch. Well, not Darrel."

He started towards me.

I moved away.

He climbed onto Breccan's bunk.

My first thought was to call for Darrel. But I didn't. As much as they'd fought, Darrel and Jon were friends. And Breccan and I were just the two girls who'd came along for the trip and shot them both down.

I didn't think I could trust him to help me.

I grabbed at Jon, trying to pull him off of her. He slapped me hard against my temple and I fell back against the cabin wall.

I pulled at him again.

He struck me harder, right across my face.

I could feel my nose bleeding.

I ran to galley and pulled out the cast iron pan.

I swung it at his head.

He groaned and turned to look at me.

He climbed off the bunk.

I held the pan up beside my head.

"I'll hit you again," I said.

He stumbled toward me, waving his arms like an angry bear. "You crazy bitch! You could have killed me."

He grabbed my arm and the pan, trying to wrestle the weapon away from me.

I sent my knee up at his groin.

He dropped to the floor of the cabin.

I was tempted to hit him with the pan again.

"What the hell?" I heard Darrel say. "What the fuck did you just do, Steph?"

I kept a hold on the pan as I backed away from Jon. "He attacked her," I said. "He was going to rape her."

"Seriously?"

"Yeah."

Darrel shook his head. "I can't believe that."

Jon slowly stood up. "She's full of shit," he said.

Darrel reached for the pan.

I let him take it. I didn't know what else to do.

"What did you do, Jon?" he asked.

"What do you mean?" Jon said.

"Well you must have done something here. Steph's nose is bleeding and I can almost see bits of that tiny lizard brain of yours."

"She just lost it on me."

"Come on. Just tell me the truth, man."

"She blames herself... you know, for Breccan trying to off herself and everything. Steph's losing her mind. She just flipped out on me."

"So you were sitting around with no pants on and Steph just decided to try and kill you?"

"I don't know why... she just went at me."

"You know that isn't true," I said to Darrel. "You know I wouldn't just attack someone with a cast iron pan."

"I know," Darrel said. "And now we have another problem to deal with."

"Whatever man," Jon said. "You want to take this bitch's word over mine, that's fine. Just both of you stay clear of me, alright?"

"Alright," Darrel said.

Jon put on his pants and his raincoat and climbed back up to the cockpit.

I stumbled over to my bunk and collapsed. I didn't bother trying to clean up my face, and to Darrel's credit, he didn't try to lick the blood out of my nostrils.

He sat down beside Breccan, still gripping the bloody pan.

"Things are falling apart," he said.

"They're long past falling apart," I replied.

He tried to hide it, but I could tell he was crying.

**WEDNESDAY - Nine Days Adrift**

**NO RAIN** again. There's no bright side left.

We left one of the rainiest places on earth and now it feels like we're in a desert. It's warmer today, so I dragged a finally-awake Breccan up for some fresh air. She was dressed in a long-sleeve shirt, which covered up her bandages nicely; I didn't want her to think about the scars she'd be left with.

As soon as Jon saw us he looked down at his feet. I couldn't tell if it was regret or disgust.

"You should go down to the salon," Darrel told him.

"It's okay," I said. "We can all sit up here today... make the best of it." It felt unnecessary to hate a dying man when you're on your own deathbed.

Darrel shook his head. "I don't think so. Jon and I will go down to the salon. You girls enjoy the weather."

"Yeah... alright," Jon said.

He and Darrel went down into the cabin while Breccan and I sat in the cockpit.

"I don't know why you stopped me," Breccan said. "I made my choice."

"It wasn't a good choice," I said.

"You took it away from me. That wasn't up to you."

I took her hand. "There's still hope, Breccan. Until the last minute there's hope. You just need to hold on."

She sighed. "I don't want to hold on. I'm tired."

"I don't want to lose you," I said. "Stick through this with me, okay?"

"I don't think I can."

"I'm not going to accept that."

She turned away and stared out at the sea.

I heard Edgar caw to us. I assume it was to us, just as I assumed the raven was Edgar, because we were all there was out there to hear him.

"That crazy bird," I said. "I think he followed us from Hotspring Island."

"That's stupid. No bird is going to follow a sailboat for a week and a half to the middle of nowhere."

"I don't know what else could be happening," I said. "There's no land in sight."

"Then I guess Edgar is just as stupid as we are," Breccan said. I think she had the slightest smile on her face, and it made me feel a little bit better.

"Are you cold?" I asked her.

"Yeah... it's not as nice out here as it first seemed."

"I know."

We helped each other down the stairs to the salon, both of us leaning on the other; I wasn't as healthy as I wanted to pretend I was, and Breccan wasn't the total weakling she wanted to be.

We reached the cabin to find Darrel sitting at the table, flipping through the same charts I'd seen Jon playing with before.

I didn't see Jon anywhere, though; I'd never thought of him as the type to hide under a blanket.

"Where's Jon?" Breccan asked.

"He's taking a nap," Darrel said, pressing his index finger to his nose. "Don't wake him."

"That's not really a big concern for me," I said.

"I found something," Darrel said. "You girls are going to want to kiss me."

He reached down by his feet and I started to panic. He pulled out a box of crackers.

"You're shitting me," I said, breathing out heavily.

"They fell behind the drawer. They're stale, crushed, and half gone, but they're food."

"We need to count them out and ration them," I said.

Darrel grinned. "Live a little, Steph."

Breccan didn't pause. She rushed over to the table and started eating.

Darrel stood up and gave her room, like he was worried she'd chew his arm off.

He walked over to me like he was expecting a hug.

"She's going to eat all of it," I said.

"That's fine," he said.

He reached behind me, grabbing a roll of duct tape off the counter; I hadn't noticed it there.

He grabbed my neck and pushed me down.

I lost my balance and fell to my knees. I tried to get up and away, but he already had his boot against my left ankle, twisting it in and against the floor.

"Breccan," I called out. "Help me out here."

She didn't answer.

He forced my hands behind my back.

"Breccan!"

Still nothing. I could see her watching, her mouth stuffed full with stale crackers.

She kept chewing.

He had my wrists bound quickly, and he bound my ankles the same way. The pain in my ankle was intense, but felt more like a sprain than a break.

He then taped my wrists and ankles together, making me feel like a pig at a luau. Luckily we were fresh out of apples for my mouth, and Breccan was doing her best to eliminate the crackers.

"Are you going to do anything to help me, Breccan?" I asked.

"I can't help you," she said. "There's no point."

"No point? What is wrong with you?"

"Maybe she knows that I'm trying to save you," Darrel said.

"Save me? From what? Blood circulation?"

"From yourself." He walked over to the table. "All done the crackers?"

Breccan nodded.

"Go lay down in your bunk," he said.

She didn't say anything else; she just stood up from the dinette and walked over to her bunk.

"There's still blood on it," she said.

"That doesn't matter."

She climbed into bed.

Darrel began to wrap the duct tape around her body, strapping her to the bunk.

"Please don't," she said.

"I have to," he said, like a parent explaining bedtime to a toddler.

"Okay."

I watched him finish taping her, unsure of the point. There was no reason to restrain us; all we'd been doing was waiting to die.

"Don't worry," he said to me. "It'll be okay."

"There's no way you can expect me to trust you," I said.

"I don't need you to trust me."

He walked over to a Jon-sized lump on another bunk. He peeled back the blanket.

Jon was taped up, too, but it didn't look like he was conscious; I wasn't even sure he was still alive. His hair, face and neck were covered in blood. His mouth was stuffed with a rag that was held in with tape.

"Jon's probably got six or seven litres of blood," Darrel said. "You and I can sustain ourselves for maybe a week on that."

"That's sick."

"Breccan's only got three or four litres."

I looked over to her. She didn't say a word.

"You need to do it, Steph," he said. "You won't survive otherwise."

"I'm not going to be an accomplice to murder."

"It's not murder. It's the custom of the sea."

"You're insane."

"I found out my best friend is a piece of shit wannabe rapist. As if there's any reason for him to outlive the rest of us. And your roommate here decided to eat all our rations, and then when I came up with one last box of stale crackers, she ate every last one without thinking for one second of sharing it. So I taped her down on her bunk. Come on, Steph... she didn't do a single thing to stop me. She knows she deserves to die."

"Breccan," I said. "Say something, dammit. At least tell him you don't want him to drain your blood out like you're a fucking side of beef."

"I don't care anymore," she said.

"I'll keep trying the handheld," Darrel said. "If we can raise someone in time we can all make it out of here in one piece." He started to chuckle. "Well maybe not all in one piece."

He walked back over to me.

I turned away.

"Where's that raven-head dagger?" he asked me.

"What are you going to do?"

"Just tell me where it is. Your ankle hasn't broken yet, has it?"

"It's in the storage bin," I said. "At the bottom."

He walked over and dug through the storage compartment. Soon he had the knife in his hand and he was making his way back over to Jon.

"What are you going to do to him?" I asked.

"I'm hungry, Steph... aren't you?"

"Don't do it, Darrel. There's no way you can justify it."

He took the blade and sliced into Jon's thigh.

Jon's eyes shot open and he began to scream. It was muffled by the rag but was still the loudest scream I'd ever heard. He kicked against the tape, and Darrel paused a moment to grab the cast iron pan and slam it again Jon's forehead.

"Anesthesia," Darrel said.

He carved out a chunk of flesh and muscle.

"At least we still have enough fuel to fry it," he said.

He took it to the kitchen along with the bloodied fry pan and started to cook his meal.

I was horrified.

I was pretty close to vomiting.

But then the smell of the frying meat started filling the cabin, and I couldn't help but let it waft into my nostrils. It wasn't Jon; it was meat. And I was hungry.

And I knew that Darrel wasn't planning on giving me a choice.

When it was ready I didn't fight him. I took the meat and the blood.

For the first time in a week, I didn't feel hungry.

"You can't keep me taped up like this," I said.

"I can trust you?" he asked.

"I don't know." I was being honest.

He walked over with the raven-headed dagger.

I started to cry.

He cut the tape from my wrists and ankles.

"I'm going to try trusting you," he said. "During the day. You understand that I'll have to restrain you at night."

"I know."

"Everything will be okay, Stephanie." He kissed me on the forehead.

I couldn't stop crying.

**SUNDAY - Thirteen Days Adrift**

**I THINK** Jon died today. I'm not sure because he hadn't regained consciousness in at least twenty four hours, but I'd been too frightened of the truth and of Darrel to check his vitals.

This morning Darrel took the dagger and started carving more flesh from Jon's body.

I couldn't watch. I couldn't be in the same general area.

I decided to climb up to the cockpit.

"No," Darrel said. "You're not going up there by yourself."

"What am I going to do? Wave down a passing seagull?"

"Something stupid. Just stay here. I'm going to need your help in a minute."

"No. I can't watch this."

"Out of sight, out of mind, eh? You need to know where your dinner comes from."

"You're disgusting."

"Just sit down at the table and wait."

I did what he told me, clamping my hands over my ears and closing my eyes. I thought about home, not the crummy one bedroom in Burnaby I somehow managed to share with Breccan, but to the beige split-level where my parents still lived, built into the hill over Abbotsford. And I thought of the street sweepers, how they used to turn around in the middle of the street because of some imaginary boundary that it took far too long for the politicians to erase. I never thought that there'd be something comfort in thinking about the municipal clusterfucks of the Lower Mainland.

"Grab him by the feet," Darrel said. "Help me carry him up to the cockpit."

He'd wrapped Jon's body in the blanket, like a shroud, but there was no concealing the smell or the blood and who the fuck knows what else, dripping onto the floor like a Jackson Pollock.

I did what he told me.

We carried Jon up to the cockpit. We lifted him over the side and I watched him fall into the water.

Darrel hadn't bothered to weigh the body down. His former best friend bobbed in the water like a department store mannequin.

I said a prayer for Jon and for Breccan, because I knew she'd be next. Darrel had been feeding her the smallest amount of meat and blood, just enough to keep her breathing.

I wanted to stop him from cutting into her.

But I didn't want to die.

Darrel doesn't bother pretending that the handheld works anymore. He's never come out and told me, but I know that it never did. Sometimes I wonder if part of him had wanted things to end up this way.

I want to kill him.

During the day we act like everything's fine, because I don't think either of us wants to admit that eventually there will only be a place for one survivor.

Darrel keeps the raven-headed dagger strapped to his belt. He doesn't trust me at all.

At night he still tapes me up, wrists and ankles and Hawaiian roast pig. He tapes me and then he spoons me, as though we're an old married couple laying together, cuddling and relaxing and digesting our travel companions.

Edgar still circles; I'm not sure what he finds to eat in the middle of nowhere. I wonder sometimes why he's still waiting around, if he wants to stick it out to see how it all ends.

Darrel doesn't know how it's going to end. He doesn't realize that he'll be the next to go.

**TUESDAY - Fifteen Days Adrift**

**BRECCAN WILL** be dead soon. I guess for her that's good news, but I know it means that time is running out for Darrel and me.

He keeps the kitchen knives locked up in his toolbox, and I don't have much of a shot going at him with a fork. In the end I think it will have to be the cast iron pan.

I'm worried that I won't hit him hard enough the first time.

"I think I'm falling for you," Darrel said as we sat together at the dinette after the meal.

"I guess that'll make me extra delicious," I said.

"I've been thinking about that."

"I'll bet."

"It can't be much longer now. We'll reach the coast soon."

"Sure we will."

"I think we should make a deal, Steph."

"Suicide pact? I don't think it's possible to eat each other to death."

"I'm serious," he said with a frown. "We're both doctors... or close enough."

"I don't think we'd have much of a shot at a medical license now."

"What if we amputated our legs, one piece at a time? We start with one foot each, and move up from there."

"That's the stupidest thing you've ever said."

"Harsh."

"I'm not interested in playing doctor with you," I said. "Just kill me and get it over with, Sparky."

"I don't want to lose you."

"Sorry, Darrel. I'm on the menu now."

"I don't need your permission," he said. "I can just restrain you and do whatever I think is right."

"That's true. A maniac's gotta do what he's gotta do. But let's do one thing before you start slicing and dicing."

"What?"

"Fuck me, Darrel."

"That's not funny."

"I'm not joking. I haven't had sex in three months. Even if I make it out of here my prospects are going to nose dive what with one leg being shorter than the other."

"This is a trick."

"Tape me up for it if you want," I said. "Maybe I'm into that... it doesn't matter. Just fuck me, alright?"

He nodded. He walked over to grab the roll of duct tape, moving a little slower with the change in blood flow.

It was my only chance.

I ran over to the kitchen and grabbed the pan. I swung it at his head.

He swerved out of the way and grabbed my arm.

He punched me in the neck.

For a moment I couldn't breathe.

He had my wrists taped in front of me before I could even think of fighting back.

He dragged me over to the bunk.

"Three months," he said. "That's not that long."

"You've won," I said. "Please don't."

"You started this."

I heard the door of the cabin open, followed by the flutter of wings.

Edgar let out a shrill cry.

And then I heard Darrel scream. For almost a minute. Until he stopped.

Edgar perched on the railing of the bunk and stared at me.

I looked over to Darrel and saw where the raven had pecked, into Darrel's eye socket and deeper still.

I think Edgar was smiling at me.

After I'd gotten out of the tape, I climbed up to the cockpit. Edgar circled around me just like before.

I looked out to the East with the binoculars. There was still nothing in sight.

I turned and looked to the West.

And I saw a ship.

Adrift.

I'd inflated the lifeboat and grabbed the paddle and the first aid kit. With my lifevest on and a prayer said to whoever's out there, I climbed in and set off towards the ghost ship.

From what I could see from the deck of the ketch, it was a small Japanese fishing boat, probably about as small as you'd expect to see in the ocean.

I didn't know why I was going there.

It was possible that there was water and food still on board, or even a radio.

I didn't know for sure.

But somehow I knew I'd be alright.

I knew because Edgar was with me, following my little orange raft on its trip across the water.

I knew he wouldn't rest until he'd brought me back to Haida Gwaii, maybe to return the raven-headed dagger, maybe to see Paul again. Or maybe just to be his new Poesy.

I'll go back to Haida Gwaii and Hotspring Island, as soon as I'm able.

I think I owe him that.

vegans are f**king

delicious

**HOW CAN** you tell who's vegan at a dinner party?

Don't worry... they'll be sure to let you know.

That's not my joke... I read it on the Internet somewhere. It's funny because it's true, just like it's funny that vegans get so damned angry at people who make fun of them.

I mean... come on, it's just a joke.

But I'm not all about hating on vegans. I like vegans... they're fucking delicious.

That last one's not a joke.

My name is Marie-Claire Grimson. I'm a cannibal.

I also like paintball and modern art.

Larissa Huong had impeccable taste. Fancy cruelty-free clothes, high-end animal-free furniture, a hybrid convertible that makes very little sense with Beantown winters... those things were all warning signs that I just didn't bother noticing. I didn't even know that PayPal cheques could bounce.

Her apartment manager had let me in, no problem; even with my hair dyed pink I still managed to play the delicate and grieving card, telling him that Larissa is my best friend... or was... and cue the tears... Mom always tells me it's never the hair and makeup, that it's just about the boobs... yeah... but she's been a good mother to me in other ways.

The manager had left me alone in there since the Patriots were playing, locking the door up behind me. I grabbed everything I could that would fit in my purse, mostly jewelry and what I'm hoping is acid... I knew I'd only get away with taking one outfit, so I chose the one with the tags that seemed the most Italian... I can't remember if Italy's just for shoes.

It doesn't really matter... I won't get nearly enough for it on Craigslist. Tasty little Larissa owes me two hundred bucks.

As I was just about to go, I heard a voice that sounded familiar, echoing up the hallway from the doorway of apartment 1A.

"She's in there right now," the woman said. "She's robbing that dead girl blind."

"Look," I heard the manager say, "I don't want to get involved in this. You're telling me that girl with the pink hair is a murderer? You gotta be high on something, lady."

He sounded different when he spoke to her, like he felt she wasn't even worth talking to.

I had a feeling I knew who it was.

Some feet started stomping down the hall towards me. Then I heard another set in pursuit. I wouldn't have time to duck out before they reached me.

And if it really was Eleanor, I'd be better off confronting her with a witness present.

There was banging on the door, and some screaming, and after a few seconds more I heard the jangling of a keyring. The door opened to a very annoyed apartment manager and a very puffy-looking Eleanor. Her skin was bright red and her dreadlocked hair was so dirty and matted that it barely looked blond anymore.

She'd gone over to the dark side.

"You look different, Eleanor," I said, remembering how put-together she'd once been, not that she'd ever looked that good. "Your hair..."

"I look like someone who's happy now," she said. "And if you'd had your way, I'd be halfway through your lower intestine."

"You girls are friggin' loons," the manager said. "Get out of here before I call the cops."

"You aren't going to search her?" Eleanor asked.

The manager shook his head and started back towards his apartment.

"So you've moved up to real life stalking," I said. "Threatening emails weren't doing it for you?"

"You're a serial killer," she said. "I'm not going to stop until I see you strapped to a gurney with a needle in your arm."

"Then you'd better get me a gig in Texas or something. Someplace with deep-fried green beans and cowboy hats."

"I'm sure I can rent my own gurney."

I had to roll my eyes at that. "Listen... I really have to go. We just got a new PVR and I haven't had a chance to set it up to tape Jon Stewart."

And that's when she spat in my face. Her loogie tasted like smoked tofu.

If that's the worst my newfound nemesis can do, I'd say I have things pretty easy.

It's about time someone gave it to you straight about the world we live in. So many of us grew up watching McDonald's commercials and that Simpsons episode with Lisa and the Gazpacho and the "You don't make friends with salad" song... we live in this fantasy world where we let someone else do the butchering for us and we call the end result "barbecue". It's bloody disgusting... yeah... I meant to do that.

But don't worry, my dear. Marie-Claire is here to preach the gospel, to let the truth set you free.

Eating beef is way worse than eating people. It's not like cows fill out living wills before they're shot in the head with a bolt gun. They're not given a choice... no one asks them if they're looking for a way out from the cut-throat world of feedlot cliques.

People just drag them into the slaughterhouse and make that choice for them.

That's not something I'd ever do.

My parents introduced me to it, after coming back from an anthropology expedition among the Korowai of New Guinea. They'd both wanted so badly to get a taste of the forbidden long pig, but somehow they'd never gotten the chance. By the time they'd come back home they were completely obsessed with the idea.

Two days on web forums with all caps and blinking text found them a guy in Arizona who had just what they needed. There are some people pay big money to get frozen when they die. Other people want the same thing but can't afford to freeze more than the head; that leaves a whole lot of surplus parts, most pretty old and tough but you can marinate the stringiness right out if you're patient enough.

Now I've always been one of those girls who didn't like trying anything new, but before long I wanted a bite of whatever mom and dad were eating. That's the same way they got me to try asparagus for the first time.

And I liked it. The asparagus and the other thing.

But all good things come to an end, and the brownshirt fascists in Washington decided to override states' rights once again and my parents and I were left without a supplier.

Mom and Dad got separated a few months later, and while the official blame was on taking opposite sides on something called the Yanomami Controversy, I blame the change in diet. You'll get the same kind of crash if you dump carbs.

I rarely saw my father after that.

A few months after he left I had half-joked to my mother that we should try eating homeless people.

Her reply changed my life.

"There's plenty of people who don't want to live anymore," she said. "Why don't we just eat some of them?"

It's been three years since she said that. We haven't gone hungry since.

There's a lot of traveling involved in my job, not only meeting up with the terminally despondent but also with transporting clients to my DIY chop and cremation shack just off Route 62. After the first half-dozen gigs I decided to buy an old school bus that had been converted into a camper, one with such musty old canvas that the smell of death would be a much-needed improvement.

In theory I could have lived in that bus, but I chose to stay at Mom's place in Worcester. But I still ended up spending most of my time on the road.

My next gig was at an apartment just off-campus from Yale. I'd done my research by phone and Facebook, and I'd already gotten to know quite a bit about her, an existential Master of Fine Arts student with no urge to finish her studies.

They start with the light stuff, screenshots on Reddit with quotes from Ricky Gervais or Richard Dawkins. Then they move onto the hard stuff, full-on books from Hitch and friends. Some people don't think a universe without any gods is a wondrous thing. Some of those people get depressed and lose their sense of purpose... and some of them see my ad for life-ending counselling. It takes a few weeks to weed out the rotten fruit, but it's worth it in the end.

I parked the old school bus a good block away. She was supposed to be waiting at the door, but I couldn't see her; it's not unusual to get cold feet. I buzzed her and she asked me to come up. I figured it was probably around 70/30 that I'd be getting my money and meat tonight.

But then the door opened to four dreadlocked women armed with frying pans and duct tape. One of them was my precious Eleanor. It wasn't going to be my night.

"Get her!" one of the women screamed as the others tried to corral me into the kitchen.

"Meat is murder!" another one shrieked as she tried to brain me with a skillet.

I ducked to the ground and somersaulted past them, coming up against the deadbolted door. As I made my way through the locksets I felt them grabbing me.

"I help people," I said as I finally pulled the door open. "Please don't hurt me."

But they had me then, my arms forced behind my back as they started to tape me up.

"You don't help people," Eleanor said. "You were going to eat me, bitch."

I wondered what they'd do with me, if they were going to beat me up and leave me in a dumpster, or if they were going to drag my bound ass down to the police station. Either way, I knew I wasn't going to be reimbursed for mileage.

As they started to shuffle me out the door a stocky man appeared from the hallway, stepping alongside me. He was wearing a ball cap and carrying a square leather bag over his shoulder. He looked at me and smiled.

"Hazing?" he asked as he started to unzip the bag. "I love college girls."

"We didn't order any pizza," Eleanor said.

"I'm pretty sure you did. Cheese and bacon."

"We're vegans, asshole."

"I don't judge."

I took the opportunity and pulled away from my captors. I pushed past the delivery man and ran out into the hallway and down two flights of stairs, almost falling a few times since I couldn't grab onto the railings.

By the time I reached the bottom, the pizza guy was right behind me. The vegans were nowhere to be seen.

I'd made it out.

"I'll help," he said. He started to tear at the tape and any of my attached arm hair. "My name is Michael."

"I'm Marie-Claire," I said between curses.

"It's nice to meet you. Would you like to have coffee sometime?"

I felt like I owed him so I told him yes, despite his being at least thirty and oddly unashamed of being an overgrown pizza boy. And maybe because he was nothing like the men I'd dated before, by the end of our first date I knew I'd want to see him again.

So that crazy bitch Eleanor wanted to kill me and somehow that made me want to date a guy who delivers pizza as a career.

It's funny how the universe conspires against you sometimes.

I dated Michael for three months before I told him what I did for a living. I figured by that point that if he really was husband material he'd be too comfortable with me to let an alternative lifestyle get in the way; I'd been more than open-minded about his foot fetish.

We were laying on his pull-out bed after a really good home-cooked dinner and even better sex; he had one arm wrapped over my hip and the other cradling my head.

I felt safe with him. That's not something a girl's supposed to say these days, but that's still how it felt.

Now I wanted Michael to love me, and I was pretty sure he did, but I needed to be certain of it...

I took a chance and I told him.

"I'm not like most consultants," I said. "My job is to help people."

"You're right," he said, "that's nothing like the consultants I've known."

"I'm serious... some people want to die, and I help them do it. Everybody wins."

He looked at me intently, obviously searching for the right words. "I'm sure you honestly feel that you're helping them... and it's not my place to judge you." He didn't seem too impressed, but he hadn't pulled away.

"I'm actually pretty picky," I said. "I won't take just anyone. Younger's always better, women are more tender... vegans are the best."

"I don't follow."

"My mom and I eat them."

He laughed. "I guess you need to have a sense of humor in your line of work."

"I'm not joking."

His face got really serious right then and I was glad I hadn't deleted my eHarmony account.

I reached up and kissed him on the lips.

He didn't kiss me back.

"I'm not a bad person," I said.

He didn't answer.

I looked down at the bed, but I could feel him still staring at me. I thought about just grabbing my stuff and leaving, not saying another word to him ever again.

But then I felt his hand brush the hair away from my face. "I want to try some," he said.

I looked back up to him. "You're serious?"

He nodded. "I want to know what it's like."

"That's... that's good," I said, the aroma of dinner, pineapple and ginger and fresh-cooked meat, still wafting on my breath. "Because you've already tried it."

"I did?"

"Polynesian style."

He gave me a smile and then he gave me a kiss.

And I started to believe he'd stick around for a while.

I was relieved when Michael said he wanted to come with me on one of my gigs, not just because it meant he supported me, but also because I'd started to worry about falling into another trap set by the four vegans.

After the incident in New Haven, I'd started to get threatening e-mails and phone calls, so many that I had begun to put off checking my messages for as long as I could. They said they would get me, that they'd teach me a lesson... I never would've figured on people who love animals being so dead-set on gutting a human being. And I'm not sure how they get enough protein to have the energy.

I took Michael with me to a late-night call in Framingham, to meet a woman in a red Subaru by the Sudbury Dam. When we found the car he waited in the camper and watched while I walked over to meet her.

I came up to the driver's side door and waved.

She lowered her window, and I could that she was a pretty and well-dressed young woman. I started to wonder if it was a bad idea mixing Michael with cute chicks who have nothing to live for.

"I'm Marie-Claire," I said.

"Danae," she said. "I'm glad you're here."

Something seemed off about her. I glanced around looking for anything suspicious, but the parking lot was pretty empty.

"You've got a note ready?"

She held up some sealed envelopes. "One for each of my parents. And a scented one for Dr. Oz."

"So it's okay to leave your car here? There's a place where we'll go..."

"I don't need it."

She opened her car door and stepped out, leaving her keys in the ignition.

We walked back to the bus together. Her gait was steady and she didn't seem nervous at all.

I introduced her to Michael, who obviously had no idea what to say. They sat together at the kitchenette while I drove towards the Interstate.

"Thank you for helping me," Danae said. "For some reason I just don't have the guts to do this by myself."

"I understand," I said. "No one wants to be alone when they make such a big decision."

She didn't say anything in reply. I glanced back and saw her smiling at Michael. I wouldn't say I was jealous... it was just that her behavior wasn't making a lot of sense.

...I wasn't jealous.

"Can I ask you why you want to end your life?" I asked.

"I don't know," she said. "I just don't feel like I connect with this world, you know?"

"I know."

"My boyfriend broke up with me last week... god... it turns out he was dating my roommate at the same time." She sighed. "But I'd still take him back if he'd have me."

I could see Michael's face tense up through my rearview mirror.

"That's unfortunate," I said to her. "There's nothing worse than feeling like you have no one to turn to."

"Hold on," Michael said.

"Don't interrupt," I told him. I knew I was losing her, that it didn't feel right... but it wasn't his place to speak up.

"No, seriously..." he said. "Danae, I don't know you very well, but I think you're a good person. I'm sure there are people out there who care for you deeply."

"I don't know," Danae said.

"Shouldn't you wait until you're sure? This is a pretty final step."

"It's her decision, Michael," I said. "It's not up to you."

"No, he's right," Danae said. I could hear her starting to cry. "God... I don't want to do this. It's not too late, is it?"

"It isn't too late," I said. I knew I'd lost her. I put on the brakes and prepared to turn the camper around. "Hopefully your car is still there."

I didn't have anything else I wanted to say, and I did my best to tune out whatever else that ditz was talking to Michael about.

After we dropped Danae off and took enough money from her to pay for our gas, I drove Michael back towards New Haven. He sat up in the front with me, but I didn't feel like talking.

"You're staying the night?" he asked as we pulled onto I-84.

"I'm still mad at you," I said.

"She didn't really want to die. You know that." He put his hand on my lap. "It was just like what happened with Eleanor. How many unsatisfied customers do you want?"

I realized right away; we hadn't talked about that night. He shouldn't have known her name.

"What did you just say?" I said.

He pulled his hand away. And he hesitated before he spoke. "The girl who ordered the pizza that night in New Haven. The order was for someone named Eleanor."

I slammed on the brakes. Michael's head hit the windshield hard enough that I almost thought he'd cracked the pane.

"Get out," I said.

"I need to tell you something," he said.

"I don't want you to tell me anything. Just get out."

"Please, Marie-Claire... it's important."

"Get out!"

So he did, stepping out into the woods of southern Massachusetts. He was staring at me with a plaintive look... I was tempted to run him over.

He'd known about Eleanor, showing up at just the right time with a pizza box and a phony smile. And now he'd done his utmost to talk another one of my clients out of dying. Was he a plant? Some kind of pro-life zealot who didn't mind eating a little girlsteak on occasion if that's what it took to earn my trust?

I felt betrayed and heartbroken. I felt like I was losing my mind.

I drove away, leaving Michael standing on the shoulder, looking surprised that I'd carried through with it.

I didn't know how he was going to get home and I didn't care.

I turned down the next four good clients, despite some very tasty-looking profile photos; I felt like I was still being hunted, as though Michael or Eleanor and the Dreadlock Girls were watching me, waiting for me to slip up.

I didn't know if I could go out again. I didn't feel confident that I'd be able to get the job done.

But I still owed money on the bus cum camper, and there was no way I could let it be repossessed; the damned thing's filled with a sheepdog's worth of hair from New England's tastiest missing ladies.

So when the next solid call came along, I had no choice but to take it.

She lived a long way from Yale University and Michael the so-called pizza guy; that made me feel a little less uneasy. Her name was Lima and she was a laid-off line cook in New Hampshire, twenty-five, vegan and unhappy. It all sounded right.

She sounded a lot like me, actually. Except for the vegan part.

I arrived just after lunchtime at her apartment. I'd decided to meet her upstairs, and I waited for a samaritan to let me in rather than buzz her. I stood outside the door of her suite for a good ten minutes, listening for voices or for any other sign that I was walking into a trap.

All I heard was a very poor rendition of Rebecca Black's "Friday". That didn't worry me too much.

We sat together on her leather couch, talking about the decision she was making; I even read her goodbye notes as a kind of test.

Lima seemed perfectly legit; I told her I was willing to take her with me.

She put on a sweater and an expensive-looking silk scarf and climbed into the camper with me, sitting in the passenger seat as we headed south on I-89. We talked for quite a while, and from what I could tell she was the right mix of sensible and scared.

"I'm embarrassed," Lima said after an hour or so, "but I need to go pee. Can we stop somewhere?"

"I guess," I said. "Does it matter where?"

"Anywhere."

There's nothing innately suspicious about bathroom breaks, but I was feeling paranoid. Since Lima didn't have a place in mind, I stayed away from the upcoming service station and decided to pull off the Interstate completely. I took her to a restaurant right next to the covered bridge in Contoocook.

"I'll wait here," I said.

Lima went into the restaurant and I waited, flipping through the first few pages of a Stephen King novel that Michael had once lent me. I read a King story once where a man stranded on a desert island had started to eat parts of himself. I wondered how many hours of waiting in the bus it would take before I started to chew on my left arm.

The door opened sooner than I'd expected and I turned to give Lima a smile. But looking back at me instead was Eleanor. She was pointing a handgun at me. I wasn't sure it was real.

"Get up," she said.

I stood up from the driver's seat, and she shoved me towards the back of the bus.

The door opened again and Lima stepped inside.

"Don't come in here," I said. Then I noticed the two women behind her. Both in dreadlocks, one holding a knife.

I had a feeling I wouldn't get a chance to escape this time. I don't know how many pizza places they have in Contoocook.

They taped us up on the floor, back to back, stuffing a couple of my dirtiest dishcloths into our mouths.

Eleanor was beaming like it was her wedding day, a smile filled with stress, anticipation, and a little bit of relief. "Now you'll know what it feels like," she said to me as she stuck the handgun into her ugly canvas belt.

I said a silent prayer, hoping she'd forgotten to put the safety on.

The three vegans took us back onto the Interstate, but I couldn't see enough from my place on the floor to know where we were headed. I could hear Lima sobbing quietly, and for a moment I wondered if a kidnapping was just the shock she needed to get her life back on track.

I wondered if Michael was in on it; was he following behind us with the fourth vegan? Was he coming along so he could laugh at me when Eleanor finally got her chance at whatever revenge came from the mind of a woman who'd forgotten how to bathe?

Part of me hoped he was in on it, so I'd get one last chance to see him again. And maybe bite off his left testicle.

They cut off the tape a couple of hours later and led us out of the camper. It was late afternoon now, and from the smell we seemed to be in the middle of a fish canning district.

"Where are we?" I asked as we were brought out into an empty parking lot.

"Last stop," Eleanor said. "New Bedford, Massachusetts."

I knew just enough about New Bedford to know my day was going to end badly.

A Prius pulled in behind the camper. I watched to see who would get out; it was the fourth vegan.

"Michael's not here?" I asked.

"Who the hell is Michael?" Eleanor asked.

I didn't know how to feel.

They led us inside a manufacturing plant that stank of fish. There was no one inside. All I saw was the machinery, big, silent and dirty.

"This is where you're going to kill us?" Lima asked.

Eleanor nodded.

"You can't kill us," I said. "You're vegans. That's completely counter to everything you believe in."

"I'm anti-speciest," Eleanor said.

"What the hell does that mean?"

"I fight against human privilege. Sometimes that requires a little affirmative action at the fish plant." She shook her head at me. "You were going to eat me, Marie-Claire. Now we're going to eat you."

"The best meat's in the rump," I said. "Make sure you kiss it first."

"This has nothing to do with me," Lima said, her voice trembling. "I didn't eat anyone."

"You're innocent, I guess," Eleanor said. "And I'll bet you told Marie-Claire that you're a vegan, too?" She sounded pretty skeptical.

"That's right, she _is_ a vegan," I said. "No animal products of any kind."

"Really?" Eleanor poked Lima in the stomach. "Wool sweater... silk scarf... fancy cow-skin shoes. Someone here is a pretty shit-awful vegan."

"I don't eat dairy," Lima said.

"We're making the right choice here," Eleanor said.

I heard a jarring noise as the machinery powered on.

"We're ready," one of the other vegans said. "Put one on the belt."

Eleanor looked over to Lima. "Take off your clothes," she said.

Lima gave out a whimper but then she did as she was told.

Once she was naked, Eleanor and one of her companions lifted Lima up and threw her onto the conveyor belt. The belt wasn't moving at that point, and Lima just laid there, motionless.

"She's too big for the cooker," Eleanor said. "We'll need to hash her."

"I brought something for that," one of the other vegans said. She brought over a large silver cleaver and traded it to Eleanor for the handgun.

"You -- you're kidding," Lima said from her place on the belt.

And then Eleanor took the first swing.

I didn't watch.

Lima didn't say anything else.

After less than a minute of cutting I heard the conveyor belt start to run.

"This is what's coming to you," Eleanor said to me. "I'm going to hash you up, and then we'll steam cook you until you're just right..." She held up her fingers, as if she were counting steps.

"Then we'll press the oil out of you, and dry what's left of you out before we grind you up and stuff you into fertilizer bags. There'll be bits of you in community gardens all over New England."

"I can't believe you're doing this," I said. "Lima didn't deserve any of this."

"You can ask her about it once she's all bagged up." She started to giggle. "Then it's your turn."

I made the decision quickly; I was better off with a couple of bullets in my hide than chopped up on a conveyor belt. I gave Eleanor a shove and turned to run, but I had two vegans clinging onto me within five seconds.

They held me as Eleanor took out her duct tape.

"You don't want that stuff in your plant food," I said. "Think of all that adhesive."

"It's no worse than whatever poisons you use in that chemical-sprayed hair of yours," Eleanor said.

I glanced over at her filthy blond locks. "I'm well aware of how much you girls hate shampoo."

They taped over my mouth before I could ask why they also seemed to hate soap.

And then I waited as the remains of Lima were pressed and ground.

As promised, Eleanor showed me a bag of Lima-meal. It looked like a cross between cremation ash and cinnamon. I'd be lying if I told you I wasn't curious about the taste.

"Now we'll take off your clothes," Eleanor said, holding up the cleaver. "I hope the cutting isn't too messy."

"I hope you hack off one of your fingers," I tried to say, but with the tape over my mouth I'm not sure she got it.

She started with my belt, gingerly cutting through the leather.

I heard a door open, and then came a familiar voice.

"FDA!" Michael called out. "Drop your weapons!" He was wearing body armor and toting some kind of semi-automatic rifle.

Two of the vegans were quick to surrender, putting their hands in the air. But the girl right next to Eleanor lifted up the handgun to take aim.

The gunshots came, two of them, and the armed vegan fell to the ground.

Eleanor brought the cleaver up to my neck. "I'll slice her open," she said.

"I don't care," Michael said. "She's a serial killer, you know."

Eleanor looked surprised. "You know about her?"

"That's why I'm here... to bring her to justice."

She kept the blade against my skin. "So what about me?" she asked. "What happens to the rest of us?"

"Put down the meat cleaver... I'll run your IDs and as long as you're clean you can go. Then the story will be one vegan vigilante, acting alone."

Eleanor seemed to think it over... then she lowered her arm.

"Everyone on the ground," Michael said. "Hands on your heads."

The vegans complied; I wasn't sure how I'd be able to do the same, so I just stayed as I was, my wrists taped behind me and a couple of strips over my mouth.

He took out three sets of plasticuffs and restrained all three vegans before coming over and ripping off my tape.

"Are you okay, Marie-Claire?" he asked.

"I'm alright," I said. "Are you really with the Food and Drug Administration?"

"I was. I'm on disability now. Raw milk raid. I accidentally got some of it on my lips."

"You're joking."

"I was suspended for messing up your case. I lost some evidence, falsified some reports..."

I smiled. "So you're not going to arrest me?"

"I may slip some cuffs on you," he said with a smirk. "But that's more for personal consumption."

I laughed and then I gave him a kiss.

He told me he'd help me clean up the mess.

"Sorry about Lima," he said once I'd come back inside with my trusty bolt pistol.

"I just wish you'd gotten here in time."

"I did, actually... she was a loose end. Uh... sorry about that."

I shrugged.

I walked over with the bolt pistol and did the first two vegans, saving Eleanor for last. She was shaking when I reached her.

"You did want to die," I told her.

"But then I changed my mind," Eleanor said.

"I know... that's why I didn't kill you. You should have returned the favor." I didn't wait for a reply. I held the pistol to her temple and fired.

"They call them fish fingers in England," Michael said as I mixed up the batter in his kitchen.

"Fish fingers? That's sick."

"And misleading... I'll bet the fish sticks we're making will be less than one percent finger."

I laughed. "I hope they taste okay. That meal powder was pretty dry. Not to mention the ground up dreadlocks."

"I'm sure they'll be perfect," Michael said. "You're an excellent cook." His face got all serious, and then he started fumbling in his pockets. "And well... uh... that's why I want to marry you."

My heart started to pound and I could feel my whole body shaking.

He pulled out a little box, and then he opened it up to a small diamond ring. "I love you, Marie-Claire," he said.

It felt like it was too soon... _way_ too soon... and at first all I wanted to do was run away.

I don't think you can blame me for that.

But then it hit me.

I had nothing to lose.

Either Michael would be the perfect husband and would love me forever and ever, or I'd have something special, if a wee bit stringy, to bundle up and roast when Dad comes home next Thanksgiving.

Either way works for me.

mADDY mCkAY

AND THE

eLVES IN hER hOUSE

**THE SCALE** was broken... that had to be it. How could it say that Maddy McKay was losing weight when everything else told her she was inflating like a balloon? Even her five tiny house-elves had noticed the lack of progress, though they had been far too polite to mention it... or most had been; Alberich Blue-hat often mooed now whenever Maddy walked into the room. Evidently, he thought he was being funny.

Maddy had done it all, Atkins and the South Beach Diet, the Subway diet and the one where you only eat cauliflower and raw salmon... and she'd been blasting her calves so hard they felt like two flabby rolls of patent leather. Alberich had even quipped that Maddy's best chance of losing weight would be to saw off her legs and sew them into fine Italian handbags. She began to worry once she found his stash of sewing patterns and hacksaws of various tooth lengths.

So Maddy went further.

She now would skip lunch and then she'd skip dinner, trying to motivate herself with visions of the wondrous new clothes she could buy. Wondrous new clothes to attract all sorts of men, up to and including the dreamy Benjamin Trasett who lived across the hall.

One day soon, she told herself... one day soon... skinny jeans for oh so skinny legs, nice short skirts that flare out and stay miles higher than her knees, swimsuits that didn't even come with matching shoulder covers... if only her body would cooperate.

At first Maddy knew nothing about it; she'd starve herself and exercise until she bled, going to bed exhausted and hungry, falling asleep to the skinny person clothes and inspirational strains of Project Runway and then dreaming of Tim Gunn's shining smile and silvery coif.

And then she'd wake up the next day and drag herself into the bathroom, ignoring the creaks in her joints, the pains in her muscles, and the Holstein bellows of a sadistic blue-hatted house-elf; once there, she'd climb onto that scale once again.

And then she'd see exactly what she wanted to see: pound by pound dropping away -- she'd gone far past her goal, or so the little numbers told her. And the elves would rejoice, Elfriede and Vena hugging her ankles, Elga and Durin humping her heels. Even Alberich would seem touched by her progress, choosing those very moments to remind her that even cows have value beyond their flank steaks.

But though her weight seemed lower, Maddy's clothes were never looser; in fact, they felt tighter, her shirts and her jeans squeezing her tightly like a full-body corset. It was like all her work was making things worse.

But after a month she had an idea; if mornings were rough, she'd switch to the evenings. The weigh-in moved to after her dinner, now a meal of hot water soup with a hint of scotch whiskey, and after she'd done slurping she would try on her clothes.

And so she did, and while the scale told the same lies the clothes now fit her better. So much better, in fact, that she felt like a woman again and not a tightly cased sausage. So she squealed with delight, knowing that this time it was different; this time her body was listening. And then she turned on the TV and soon fell asleep.

The next day she awoke with a smile and a deep pain in her stomach, and after a heavy breakfast of four oversized grapes, Maddy went to her closet to dress for work.

And the clothes didn't fit; the clothes were too tight.

Maddy squealed in frustration.

And Alberich laughed. And then he mooed. And then he laughed again.

And Maddy felt he was acting a little suspicious.

She left her apartment and went across the hall, making sure that her house-elves had not come along. She knocked on the door of dreamy Benjamin Trasett, and he answered with a smile and a welcome fib about all the weight she had lost.

She asked for a favour, and Benjamin said yes; he always said yes, with a dumbfounded smile and a bulge of his eyes.

She went back to her apartment to lay out the trap. She needed a distraction, so she spun up her Tivo for the elves' favorite show. And as every last house elf sat on the couch, eyes glued to The Donald and his tower of hair, Maddy laid out the sticky pads at the door to her closet.

And then she changed over to Runway and got ready for bed.

The next morning came and Maddy's life changed. She passed on the grapes and a reheating of last night's soup of hot water; she got out the frying pan and a big stick of butter. And she made a new breakfast to kick off her new life.

She'd used up all five of the sticky pads at once. She found five tiny house-elves stuck to those pads, each one brimming over with remorse and carrying a tiny needle and thread. She'd realized only then that it had been a team effort.

And for the first morning in months her pants weren't too tight. And her shirts hung too loosely, and even her socks felt too big. Just one night was enough to show her what's what.

Maddy McKay really was skinny; her time had finally come.

In fact, she could probably stand to gain a few pounds.

Maddy looked back to her breakfast, in the frying pan she'd rediscovered at long last. She'd had a full serving of food, at least. But she could eat more.

She went back for seconds, and thirds, fourths, and fifths. It was the best meal she'd had in forever.

Her five tiny house-elves were completely delicious.

The Ocean Goddess and The Home Run Queen

_DANGER_ **, MY** goddess would whisper softly to me whenever The Wolfman would approach. _Danger_.

His thick and brown-black facial hair, his wet-dog musk and throaty New York accent, his ivory-white fake fangs sticking out against his yellowed smokers' teeth.

He was my kind of danger.

My goddess would always tell me that The Wolfman was legit, that there was something supernatural about him. My goddess told me he was just like us.

But the rest of me knew it was an act, plastic wolf teeth and all. I'd met many fakers like him on both sides of Freak Alley, people so bored with being ordinary that they run straight to being monsters. I knew that The Wolfman had been a nobody before he'd gotten dressed up. But that didn't bother me. Real or not, The Wolfman was exactly the kind of guy I'd like to bring home and check for ticks.

Not that he was the type to "go home" with anyone; he'd always been an open air kind of guy, preying on the fudgies mostly, sniffing out the prettiest tourists and taking them out to the woods like any authentic wolfman should. On occasion he'd go for one of the girls who worked at the carnival, but he hadn't gone for me just yet.

I guess you have to work your way up to the Home Run Queen of The UP.

I saw him with Anastasia once, right before she left town without a word; I was pretty sure no one missed her. He'd swooped in and picked her up in his arms, carrying her like a golden-haired sack of potatoes dressed in a polyester-blend fish tail and plastic coconut bikini cups.

I'm not going to admit to watching them together, making love or whatever you'd call it, but I will say that they did it outside like the others, somewhere out in the forest that stretches from The Bridge to Cheboygan, and that when I'd closed my eyes it was me who was pretending to be a mermaid getting pounded by that broad-shouldered half-wolf, twenty feet away from the spot where they dump all the grease from the deep-fryers.

They'd still been going at it, when after twenty minutes I'd decided to go back to my camper and do something just for me. I no longer had hot water for my massaging showerhead but I found a way. And that was what got me started on thinking about the day when it'd finally be my turn with The Wolfman.

I'd seen how he looked at me.

I was sure if it wasn't for my uncle I'd've already had a poison ivy rash between my thighs.

Wednesday started off badly when I realized I forgot my iPhone in the shower room at the bunkhouse. It got even worse after my first show, when Sandra the slime-mold talent agent stopped by my tank again, clapping like a blonde harp seal at the end of my act. She acted like she hadn't already watched the same pearl-diving stunt of mine on both Monday and Tuesday.

"You were great, Vanessa," she said once she had me trapped by the ladder, stuck between the tank wall and a crowd of sticky kids looking for autographs. "Sexy as always."

"I'm not comfortable being hit on in front of children," I said.

"I have another opportunity. Atlantic City. Brand new attraction. AC is on the upswing."

"Have a good flight."

"Hear me out. I can get you a real audience for once. Must get tough playing for a few bargain-bin tourists and a buttload of moose."

"Look... I'm not interested." I tried to sound a little more gruff than the last time, without letting on to the waiting ten-year-olds and a handful of lust-addled teenage boys that I was losing my cool. I didn't want the attention you'd get from being that short-tempered diving chick. I didn't want all eyes on me and the hard-to-see slits at the back of my neck.

"You weren't interested in Sandusky. I get that. _Barf_. But this is Atlantic City. The Jersey Shore."

"I'll never be able to orange my skin enough for that," I said.

"They'd love you just as you are. Girl next door with a touch of the exotic." She took a deep breath. It might have been a dramatic pause. "Say goodbye to Mackinaw, hun. First you play AC for a few months. Then it's the big time. Television. Maybe even basic cable."

I tried to slip around her. "I really need to go."

"Think about it, Nessie."

"Nessie?"

"Nessa?"

"People are waiting to talk to me."

She gave me a wide smile. "You're busy," she said. "I know that. We'll talk again tomorrow."

She'd said the same thing on Monday. And Tuesday. I knew she'd say the same thing every day from then until I either said yes or drowned her in my tank.

There'd always be too many witnesses around for that.

"You need to leave me alone," I said. "My uncle wouldn't be too happy to find out you're sniffing around his place for clients."

"I'm not sniffing. I know exactly what I want. And I've talked to your uncle. He thinks you should take a chance. You know, live a little."

"You've gotta be kidding me... you didn't seriously talk to him about this. Do you get that I hate your guts?"

I could hear a couple of the kids snickering, along with a few parents gasping. One of the teenage boys gave out a little hoot, grinning wildly underneath his training stache. I'd seen that kid around before, more than a few times. I'd started to think of him as my first overly-attached fan, short and skinny, and obviously a local with his NMU wildcats shirt and matching camo baseball cap.

"Don't make this mistake," Sandra said. "You're young and beautiful. Everyone loves you. We need to cash in on that. I'm going to keep on you until you see what you're throwing away."

"Just leave me alone," I said. "Please..."

"We'll talk again."

"No --"

"Tomorrow."

She smiled one last time before turning and walking away.

I needed to find a way to keep her from coming back.

The Wolfman waved me down at lunchtime. That was a first.

"Eat with me," he said, his mouth half-stuffed with beef kabob.

I sat down at his picnic table, narrowly avoiding a white smear of bird poo.

"You look like you need a vacation," he said. "Rough morning?"

"I'm being stalked by a cougar from Grand Rapids."

"The dye-job blonde that's been hanging around your tank?"

"That's her. She wants me to run off to Atlantic City."

"Maybe you should go. You'd be great at it." He didn't sound like someone who was overly concerned with me sticking around.

"It's the same stuff I do here," I said. "Only it's away from my family and for not much more money."

He grinned. "Away from your uncle? That's living the dream. But you know that I'll miss you, Vanessa."

That was unexpected. "Uh, me too... Wolfman."

"That's _The_ Wolfman. It's all about branding."

I laughed. "Do you ever tell anyone your real name?"

"It's Quinn," he said, not that I believed him. "And now that we've been officially introduced... I really think you should keep an open mind about that offer."

I smirked. "Open mind, huh? I'll bet that's just what you told Anastasia before you filleted her in the forest."

He grinned. "You know what I mean." I felt his hand on my knee. It was close to touching my thigh... but not quite. "I wouldn't want you staying here just because of me."

I wasn't sure what that was supposed to mean. "Okay, then," I said. "I've got to go. I forgot my stupid phone in the bunkhouse."

"What were you doing there? You have a trailer."

"Taking my morning cold shower. There's no hot water but it beats a sponge bath in the water fountain."

"You're still using the bunkhouse to shower? But those people are animals."

"We can't all afford a fancy supertrailer with indoor plumbing. Not on a pearl diver's salary."

He smiled. "You can use my tub," he said. "It has jets and hot water and everything."

I froze for a moment. Not because Quinn The Wolfman wanted me to get naked in his trailer, but because he was letting another person into his trailer at all. He'd almost torn the Peschel twins another conjoined rectum when they'd tried to barge in on the Fourth. All they'd wanted to do was take a much-needed piss... or a pair of them, depending on how their system works.

I decided to smirk. "A hot bath in your trailer, huh? I don't know if I'm willing to pay the price of admission."

"Don't worry," he said. "I've got a date tonight. You'll have the whole place to yourself."

His little announcement sounded like a rejection, like he was doing his best to subtly tell me "thanks, but no thanks, I get plenty of grade A tail in my line of work".

"Uh... okay," I said. "I guess that works." I mostly just wanted the conversation to be over.

He lifted his knee-scouring hand and gave my lower thigh a nice, friendly slap. "Great," he said. "You'll love my collection of fine French soaps."

I got up to leave.

"It's a joke," he said. "I only use good, upstanding American soap."

I nodded and eventually I remembered to smile.

I was already missing the time in my life when The Wolfman had kept his distance.

Quinn was as good as his word, leaving his trailer unlocked and the bathroom light on, and being nowhere in sight. I'd thought of the possibility that he'd set up some kind of pinhole camera to peep on me, but I soon decided that a guy like The Wolfman didn't need to bother with deception if he wanted to film some lady parts here and there; northern Michigan has more than enough party stores per capita to make college girls do almost anything. I'm sometimes curious why the Girls Gone Wild van never came up here that often. Then I think of blackfly season and our proximity to Wisconsin and the wonder passes.

I filled up the tub as far as it would go, and then I slipped off my ill-gained Holiday Inn bathrobe and climbed in. The feeling was almost as good as the last time I'd broken a hot water fast, a few years back when I'd gone for four days without a real wash. But it didn't match that feeling, since this time it was just me and myself; there was neither a bottle of scotch nor a fellow dirty traveler to warm me up.

My current fellow traveler was out on a date, most likely with some ditzy blonde. They say a man wants to mess around with blondes and fall in love with a brunette, but I've seen no first-hand evidence of the tail end of that plan. All I'd seen lately is Northern Michigan's most eligible bachelors all shoulder-deep in fair-haired tramps.

I sighed, and then I lay back in the water and felt the heat lap over my ears. It felt good.

I dipped even lower, until I was completely submerged, other than my pointy knees popping out. My face was under the water, and I held my breath for a few seconds before I felt the gills kick in, filling my lungs with oxygen from the rusty bath water.

The goddess inside me is always waiting for that moment when the water washes over me. My goddess and I could stay there forever if we wanted to... or at least until I needed to pee.

With my eyes closed and my body cocooned in the warmth, I finally felt relaxed, and I tried to let my mind empty as I listened to the breathing from the back of my neck.

My grandmother was like me. I saw her gills and goddess once, out at Sand Point Beach by the lighthouse, back when I lived up at home. We'd been dipping our toes into Lake Superior, enjoying the painfully short summer. She'd noticed my gills first, and I guess she hadn't wanted me to feel like there was something wrong with me.

"We're blessed by the spirits of the ocean," she'd said to me. "They live on earth through us, just as we can live in the waters through them."

"But the ocean's a thousand miles away," I'd replied. I still feel like an idiot for saying that.

My grandmother had never dived for pearls, but she was the one who'd told me the story of Shinju, the Japanese diver who'd come to Hawaii and fallen in love with a big-hearted man from the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, and about how she'd decided to leave everything behind and follow him home, and make him her husband.

And she'd told me how Shinju and her goddess had battled with the dark spirits who'd hunted in the north woods. It was hard and bloody, she said. The creatures would stalk her in animal form, the spirit bear or the spirit wolf, and even a cougar or two, thinking she was easy prey. And then they'd attack. But the moment the monster would pierce Shinju's skin, the goddess would take over, scratching and tearing and killing. And by the time Shinju would awaken, the creature would be nothing more than scattered bone and blood. It was a war that had always been.

My grandmother told me of the nights when she'd walk through the forest, waiting for the spirit monsters to come and her goddess to breathe. She'd seemed disappointed when she explained that it had never happened to her, that the only creatures she'd discovered were your run-of-the-mill black bears and coyotes.

That was more than me; the closest I've ever come is getting chased by a leg-humping shih tzu at summer softball camp. Maybe Ted Nugent's right. Maybe there's a bright side to hunting prey animals almost to extinction.

My grandmother was named for her grandmother; her parents had chosen to name her in English, so Shinju became Pearl. I think my name means "butterfly".

My grandmother told me that every woman born to our family is given the gift. That gift makes what I do for a living a little too easy. Sometimes when I dive I feel a bit like a fraud.

But I guess it's not really a problem if no one finds out.

I heard a thud against the tub, and I shot up with my eyes open.

And then I heard someone swear. I looked over and saw the skinny boy with the puny little moustache, the one with the cute and creepy crush on me.

That crush became even more obvious when I realized what he'd just been doing with his right hand.

"Sorry," the boy said. He sat down on the toilet seat and cradled his hurt toe. He didn't look any older than sixteen to me; I think somehow that helped me classify him in my mind as a confused teenager with boundary issues, rather than some dangerous perv who required a serious pounding with a baseball bat. A good thing, since I'd left my bat at home.

"You're sorry?" I asked. "Sorry about swearing? Or about spying on me with your pants down?"

His face turned red. I guess he'd forgotten what part of him he was still gripping.

"How can you breathe underwater?" he asked.

"What the hell are you doing in here?"

"I saw you... you were under there for like... ten minutes at least."

"I doubt it took you ten minutes to choke your little chicken yolk."

He smiled nervously. "I kinda had a second run at it."

And then he finally pulled up his pants.

"It's an ancient technique," I said. "From Japan. Now will you kindly get out of here before I kick your pervy ass?"

He didn't budge.

"Get out!"

"You were breathing."

"I was holding my breath."

"I saw you. You were breathing. I saw your chest moving."

He'd seen my chest. Obviously. And a lot more than that. "I'm going to call the cops," I said.

He grinned.

I wasn't expecting that.

"I'm sorry," he said. "I'll leave you alone."

He climbed off the toilet and started to back away, his gaze glued to my breasts, almost tripping over the garbage can on his way out of the tiny bathroom.

I waited until I heard the door to the trailer slam before I climbed out of the tub. Not that it mattered; I doubt I had much left to hide from that kid.

Slimy Sandra didn't show up after any of my shows the next day. A part of me was almost disappointed; it's nice to be sought after, even if you question the sanity and natural hair color of the seeker.

But the pervy kid was in the crowd again, and after I'd climbed down the ladder he was huddled in at the back of the mass of eager kids and single dads.

He waited patiently while I dealt with the autographs and the banter, and the two less-than-subtle propositions, one involving adult diapers. Once he was the only person left he gave me the same creepy grin I'd seen from the night before. But this time I noticed something I hadn't noticed last night, two shiny white fangs on the sides of his mouth.

You wouldn't believe the crap they sell at the gift stand.

"No one knows about you, do they?" he asked.

"I told you. It's a breathing technique."

"Is it... surgically altered?"

"Can you just drop this? I don't see why you've latched on to me."

"Tell me about it."

I was starting to miss my bottle-blonde clapping seal and her fake eyelashes.

"Tell me about it," he said again. "Or else I'll tell everyone."

"Tell them what? You don't even know what you're talking about."

"I wonder what The Wolfman would think of your secret. Would he call you a freak, maybe?"

"Who cares? He thinks he's a character in _Twilight_."

"You care."

I knew he was right. Even if the kid never figured out what it is about me that's different, he could hassle everyone I work with until someone with half a brain finally realized that my shoddily-built dive tank was at least twenty feet too deep, or that I was always down for thirty seconds longer than the girls at Sea World. I didn't want people thinking about that.

Even my uncle didn't know about my goddess. Only the women in my family had known, the ones who'd been touched by it.

I was the only one left.

"Okay," I said. "I'll show you my secret. But not here."

"Later tonight?" He sounded way too hopeful.

"Meet me at my camper at midnight. It's down by the bunkhouse..."

"I know where it is."

"You're creepy, kid... you know that?"

"I'm happy in my own skin," he said.

I shuddered.

I'd gone from one bad stalker to someone even worse.

The Wolfman (or Quinn) stopped by my camper not long after I got there. He brought a bag of pasties and a six pack of Stroh's, and while I didn't check his pockets I was pretty sure from the smile on his face that he had a condom or two on him, too. And he was still wearing his stupid fangs.

I wondered if he ever took them out.

I wondered if that really worked on the other girls.

I wondered if I was on my way to joining their ranks.

"You like pasties, right?" he asked.

"You betcha," I said. "I'm a good little Yooper."

"I hope you don't mind me stopping in, Vanessa. A couple of the local girls convinced Horny Rich to let them throw a party in his trailer and the sounds travels pretty good."

It wasn't a terrible excuse.

We sat down at my little square dinette and began to eat.

"Got this from that place by the boat," he said.

"That could literally be anywhere in town."

"The little boat. Place was like a hundred and fifty degrees. I guess they cook up so many pasties they decided to make the whole restaurant into an oven."

"I bet it made you want to buy extra pasties."

"I get ya... marketing tactic. Sneaky bastards."

"I have to ask," I said, "what's the deal with those fake fangs?"

"They're not fake," he said.

I expected a longer answer. I just stared at him for a while.

"They're implants," he said.

"You're kidding."

"I've committed to the role. And the ladies love 'em."

" _Some_ ladies, perhaps." I gave him a light punch on the shoulder.

He seemed to like it.

As we kept talking I decided that Quinn was actually pretty funny. He had a knack both for making me laugh and always keeping me a little on edge about whether or not he actually thought I was worth his time, even taking care to make light fun of women's softball. His dating technique was dead on.

"Tell me something truly titillating about The Wolfman," I said as I started my second bottle of beer. He hadn't brought enough of it; if that Brooklyn boy was trying to get me drunk he didn't know a lot about Michiganders. It would take at least my own six pack to make this girl honk like a goose.

"Not much to tell," he said. "Got married too soon, divorced too late. I've been twenty years without a chocolate egg cream."

"I don't know what that is."

"Indescribable. One day you'll have to find out for yourself."

"Okay. What else?"

"Well... let's see... I live in the moment, but I think you know that."

"Half the women in town know that."

He laughed. "I doubt it's half. But I'm not ashamed of what I am."

I gave him a smirk. "I'd be a little ashamed of girls like Anastasia Braun if I were you."

"You didn't like her," he said. "But she had her charms. Believe me."

He was starting to lose his touch.

"I'll bet all it takes to get you going is for a girl to be blonde and pretty," I said. "I don't think I'd call either of those things charms."

"I like more than just blondes."

"Sure. I'll bet you were with a blonde last night. Probably tall, skinny, and young. God... don't tell me you went out with that skanky new girl at the lemonade stand. She looks downright diseased."

I told myself to dial it back, but I knew by then I'd already spewed enough crazy that it shouldn't matter anymore.

"I was with an older woman, actually," Quinn said. "Interesting, but a little odd..."

"And how did it end?" I don't know why I even asked. With my luck he was talking about Sandra.

"It fizzled out."

"So you won't be sampling her again?"

"I think last night was it for her, actually. I doubt I'll ever see her again."

I sighed. "I don't know how you can want that. One night stands... women you don't even care about."

"I know," he said, sounding all sensitive. "I guess there's just something inside of me... some hunger for the chase. I know I shouldn't like it so much."

I was trying to keep the new approach from working, but somehow that bullshit was wearing me down.

Fucking shit. He was winning.

"So you think it's wrong?" I asked. "Treating women like that?"

"I don't know what I think. Honestly, Vanessa... I just don't know."

He leaned in and put his hand on my thigh.

Definitely my thigh.

"I guess we're getting close to the kiss," I said. It was all so contrived, but I didn't really want to stop him.

He nodded and went for it. It was good. Probably too good. I like a little inexperience.

"My bed sucks," I said. "It feels like laying on cardboard. You don't want to try anything here."

"That's not what this is," he said. "It's not about your bed."

He gave me another kiss, quick and soft.

"You're the most beautiful creature in the world," he said. "My soul aches for yours."

I let out a giggle. "That's some bad poetry right there."

"Yeah... but I mean it."

"Okay," I said. "Um... thanks?"

He frowned. "I should go," he said. "I'll see you tomorrow."

And that was that. He left without giving me a chance to come up with a coherent response.

It worked. I could feel my knees buckling even as I sat.

The Wolfman knew his audience.

I'd almost fallen asleep when I heard the knock on my door. It was midnight and I'd completely forgotten about the pervy kid from Marquette or wherever and our little game of show-and-tell.

I let him in but I didn't invite him to sit down. I just wanted to get it over with.

From his stupid grin he looked like he'd also brought along some condoms. And I could see that he still had those lame-ass fangs jammed into his mouth.

"C'meerrr," he said. "Show me the goods."

"You're kidding."

He laughed. "Yup. But seriously... I do want to see them."

"See what?"

"The gills. I know about them."

"Gills?"

"You're really bad at this game," he said. "I know about the gills, and I know what you are."

"Wow... meth is a helluva drug."

"Your ocean spirit... inside of you."

I was sure the shock on my face was pretty clear. Somehow he just knew, like he'd found a photo of me on Wikipedia, some badly-written and poorly-sourced article telling him just who I was.

"What do you want from me?" I asked. "I don't have any money, and I'm sure as hell not giving you the other thing."

"I take what I want," he said.

He didn't lunge or anything. He just glared at me.

I wasn't sure if he expected some kind of capitulation on my part, like I was just going to sigh and lie on my back and think of England's soccer stars.

I punched him square in the eye.

He fell back and smacked the back of his head against the wall.

"Get out of my camper," I said. "I don't want to see you around here again."

"I know what you are," he said.

"You mentioned that, yeah."

"But yuh don't know what I am."

"A pervy virgin with terrible facial hair. Got it."

"I am the wolf," he said. "Just like my father and his father."

"Ah... the fangs. I get it."

"I want to keep you safe, Shinju... I want you to be happy, my pearl."

It was like a whole new level of creepy... scary creepy.

"You need to leave," I said. I sounded good and tough. But then I faltered. "Please..."

He could sense the weakness there, and he went for it. He tried to grab me but I pulled away. He gripped at my hair but I gave him a swift knee to the stomach... he was shorter than most men I'd had to kick, so I missed my intended target by a good three inches.

I followed up the knee with another eye-punch, and soon the boy was on the floor.

That's what he looked like now... a boy. A stupid, pervy little boy.

What was I supposed to do with that?

"You need to go," I said.

He slowly stood.

"Did you hear me?" I asked.

He nodded.

"This can be it," I said. "Just leave me alone from now on and I won't mention this to anybody."

He nodded again and started towards the door.

I took a deep breath.

He came at me, trying to wrap his arms around my neck.

I realized that the little idiot was hoping to choke me out. That shit never ends well.

I sent out my knee again. I didn't misjudge the height.

And then I pushed him out of the camper myself.

I locked the door and dug out my baseball bat to keep by my bed.

I opened my third Stroh's and sucked it down like a frat boy. It didn't help. It just gave me gas and made it that much harder to sleep.

But I did fall asleep eventually.

When I heard another knock I sleepily grabbed the wood bat and stumbled towards the door. It was still dark and I was still supposed to be sleeping.

"Go fuck yourself," I said to whoever it was.

"Jeez-o-pete, Ness," I heard my uncle say.

I opened the door and let him in. He looked a little ragged and very stressed out. More so than usual.

"You're drunk," he said. He invited himself to sit at the dinette, frowning at the six crumpled cans of beer. And then he started to eat the leftover pasty.

"I'm not drunk," I said. "I'm just waking up, asshole."

"I needed to make sure you're okay."

"I'm not okay. My creepy old uncle decided to wake me up in the middle of the night."

"Did you go to that party last night?"

"What party?"

"At Horny Rich's trailer. A couple girls went missing."

"Went missing? If only the police had trained a pair of vomit-sniffing dogs."

"I'm serious," he said. "They found one of the girls' handbags."

"Okay..."

"There was blood on it."

I was starting to understand why he was there. It was kind of sweet.

"I'm okay," I said. "Now you know."

"You should come stay with us."

"I'm okay. Whatever happened to those girls didn't happen to me."

"Please, Ness."

"Don't worry so much. I wasn't drunk. And I won't be drunk anytime soon. And I'll stay out of the woods... and I'll stay away from strange men who reek of drunk girls."

He shook his head at me. He knew me well enough to know that I wasn't about to change my mind.

Once he was gone I got dressed and went out for a walk in the woods. That was the quickest way to get to Quinn's trailer.

I found Quinn halfway along the trip, walking through the trees in the opposite direction. He was dressed like it was a lot colder out, with a heavy coat and long and shiny-black gloves.

"Where ya going?" I asked as we came up to each other.

"To find you," he said. "I was worried."

"What is it about me that every man in my life assumes I'll be the next murder victim?"

"What murder?" He sounded genuinely surprised.

"Didn't you run into any police?"

"I thought there was another break-in. Or maybe that Horny Rich finally tried to make his move on one of the new girls and got himself stabbed or something."

"Two missing girls," I said. "And blood."

His face changed. He had started to look worried, for real.

"What's wrong?" I asked.

"We should get back to your trailer."

I wasn't sure what he really wanted to do in my trailer.

_Danger._

I wasn't scared.

"I'm out of beer," I said.

"We need to hurry."

He grabbed my hand with his glove and started moving again, picking up the pace by quite a bit.

We reached my camper and I unlocked the door.

"I'll go in first," he said. "Wait here."

I didn't argue, although I wondered why whatever monster he was now chasing would be hiding in my camper when I'd been alone in the woods a few minutes before.

"Come in," he said. "It's safe."

I walked in.

Quinn locked the door to the camper.

I felt my stomach growl. I started wishing my uncle hadn't stolen my last pasty.

We sat down at my table again, but the romance was dead. Especially since he was still wearing his jacket and goddamn butcher gloves.

"I need to do something," Quinn said. "Something you won't like."

"Not the best come-on I've heard."

"There is a young man who's been following me. He's been... I guess 'obsessed' is the best way to put it."

"Teenage boy with fake fangs?"

"So he's been talking to you."

"Not just talking. He came after me a few hours ago."

Quinn sighed. "I'm sorry, Vanessa. I should have done something about this before. I should have realized that the boy is unbalanced."

"I'm okay."

"He's dangerous. I know that now. I think he attacked those girls tonight."

"I doubt it." It wasn't that I didn't think the boy had a mean streak; I hadn't forgotten the part where he tried to squeeze my windpipe until I passed out. It was more that I doubted he'd be able to take those girls on with his piss-poor hunting skills. They would've had to be really, really... really drunk.

"You are very special to me, Vanessa. I don't want him to hurt you."

"I'm fine. If you really believe that kid is dangerous, you should be talking to the police. I don't do a lot of crime-solving these days, you know. I mostly dive for pearls for slightly more than minimum wage."

I felt his hand on my thigh again, or his glove, at least. It gave me a cold chill. Something felt wrong.

"I've been watching over you for a long time," he said. "Ever since you arrived here."

It sounded like he'd been taking lessons on being creepy from the pervy kid.

"Are you high or something?" I asked.

"I took care of Anastasia for you. You hated her, so I sent her away. And I did the same to Sandra... just so you'd be happy... so you wouldn't leave us."

"You're telling me that fucking Anastasia in the woods was doing me some kind of solid?"

And Sandra? Eew.

"I'll get rid of this kid, too."

That was a good way to clue me in that we hadn't been talking about the same thing.

I felt his grip hardening on my leg.

"Did you kill those girls tonight?" I asked.

"That boy killed those girls. I'll protect you from him."

"You're really freaking me out. I don't get the joke here. I really don't."

"I'm going to find that boy and I'm going to slit his throat. Is that clear enough?"

"No... please don't. If you love me, you'll leave him alone."

Quinn started to laugh. "Love you? Really? That's what you think this is?"

That hurt.

"You really don't know what I am," he said.

But I did know. I'd known all along, or at least part of me did. And I'd taken those quivers and whispers for some kind of kinky attraction when I should have taken them for fear. "You're a spirit wolf," I said. "And that poor kid thinks he's a wolf, too."

"That poor kid, huh? He killed those girls because he wants to be like me."

"So you're going to kill him. And then what are you going to do with me?"

"I've waited for two years, Vanessa. I've waited long enough. I'm going to take you tonight. I'm going to take you and then I'll bury you under the trailer. Right between Anastasia and Sandra."

"That won't work," I said, having trouble even moving my lips. "You won't get away with it."

"I know. That's why I've waited so long. The time has never been right. No one cared about Anastasia; she was just a stupid little whore who wandered into camp for a few weeks. And no one even knew Sandra was here aside from the two of us."

"And my uncle."

"I doubt it."

"But my uncle knows about me. He knows I wouldn't just disappear. And now with those two girls missing..."

He shook his head. "I know, Vanessa. Even after I kill you and your family, I'll still have ruined my life here. I won't be able to stay. And I won't be able to start over as a carnival freak somewhere else. I'll have to get a job at a fucking call center." He smiled. "But you're worth it. And I get to kill a nice handful of other people while I'm at it."

I couldn't hear my goddess. I was too frightened. Was she still with me? Would she take over the moment my blood was spilled?

"I am more powerful than you," I said. "I will kill you."

"Bullshit. You've heard too many fairy tales. Do you think you're the first goddess I've killed?"

I wanted to scream. "You don't know me."

Where was my goddess?

"You're easy prey," he said as he stood up from the table. "A delicious snack before bed."

He had to spill my blood. My grandmother had known the secret; she'd learned it from Shinju herself. That had to be the truth.

The sooner Quinn cut me, the sooner I'd find out.

"Show me how tough you are," I said. I climbed out of the dinette and walked over to him.

He backed away a little. I wasn't sure what he was planning.

"You're wasting your time," he said. "And mine."

"Whatever."

I stepped forward and punched him in the mouth. I could tell that it came as a surprise.

He pushed me on my shoulders, shoving me backwards.

"You want this to hurt, don't you?" he said.

"I do. So hurt me, jackass."

He slapped me hard with his gloved hand, from cheek to cheek. I fell backwards, banging against the tabletop.

I knew there'd be blood.

I felt it running from my nose, and from a cut below my left eye.

But my goddess didn't come.

"Sit down," he said.

I sat. I was running out of options. Actually, I was completely tapped out. He'd kill me. There was no avenging ocean spirit inside of me. Just some gills.

And once I was dead, he'd kill the crazy little perv. And maybe my uncle, and the rest of my family.

"What if I help you?" I asked.

"I don't need your help. I'm not going to have any trouble ripping your heart from your beautiful chest."

I swallowed hard. It felt like I was about to watch some other idiot girl give everything up. "I'll pack my bags and I'll leave a note for my uncle," I said. "I fell in love with a young boy and I had to leave before I did something I'd regret. Would that work? Would you leave everyone else alone? My family... the little pervy kid?"

"That kid killed those girls."

"Even if you're right... why would you give a shit? You're going to kill me, remember?"

He gave me another smile. "Yeah... I am going to kill you."

"You'll be able to stay here. Keep your job. Find another exotic-looking carnival girl to go all Tom Cruise over."

"Write the letter," he said.

"Let me send my family away first. Once they're gone you can have me."

"That's a stupid plan, Vanessa. There's no way you can tell your family without giving me up. You're going to say some person is about to kill them but you don't know who?"

I had to come up with a plan.

"I can get them to leave. Just let me try."

"It won't work. You'll just bring your uncle here looking for you." He leaned in and kissed my cheek. "Here's how this is going to work. I'm going to kill you either way. So you can write the letter and trust me, or you can _not_ write the letter and know that the boy and your uncle will both die a horrible death. Oh, and then I'll kill your auntie, too. And yes... your cousins... and that stray dog that you always give your scraps to. I'll kill that little dog just for you, Vanessa." He chuckled a little. "Or, you know... you could write the goddamn letter."

I started to cry.

And then I wrote the letter.

I packed a couple suitcases while Quinn watched; I came so close to convincing myself that I really was going on a trip, to somewhere that didn't involve a shallow grave under The Wolfman's trailer.

Once everything was ready I tried to feel relieved. I had to believe that I was keeping my family alive.

I heard a knock on the door. I wondered if it was even possible that someone had come to save me.

"Ask who it is," Quinn said in a whisper.

"Who's there?"

"It's Conan," someone answered.

I didn't know any Conans.

Quinn smiled and walked over to the door. And then he unlocked it.

The pervy kid stepped inside the camper.

"You need to go," I said. "Please... get out of here."

"I'm good," the kid said. "I want to see this."

"She's all packed," Quinn said.

The kid grinned, his fangs and his pair of long black gloves shining in the orange light of the camper. "Sounds good, Dad. I brought the tape."

They'd wrapped my wrists behind my back and taped my ankles together, lying me down on the floor. They'd stuffed a hand towel in my mouth and wrapped three or four layers of duct tape right around my head.

They worked together like a team, and once they were done they took off their gloves and looked me over like I was a prize chicken.

It still seemed odd that they'd be related. I'd never thought of The Wolfman having a son, and even if I'd pictured his kid I would have imagined a tough kid from Brooklyn who was at least three inches taller and could grow a decent moustache.

"This is how it's done," Quinn said to his boy. "If you take your time and do it right, everything will work out."

"I know," the kid said. "You've told me this like a million times before."

"But you don't listen, Conan. You just run around scratching at girls in the woods. You don't even finish the job."

"I didn't want those girls to die. I didn't even mean to hurt them."

"Well you did kill them. I couldn't let them run off to the police and tell them about you. Some weird kid grasping at titties in the woods... this isn't the life I wanted for you."

"I know... I'm sorry, Dad."

"It's a start. Now let's get it done."

The kid nodded as he pulled off another long strip of tape. He wrapped it around my head again, but instead of covering my mouth one more time, he brought it right over my nose. And then he stuck his fingers in my nostrils, sealing them up completely.

"Do another one," Quinn said.

So the kid did.

I waited for a moment, wondering what would happen. I couldn't draw any air in through my nose or my mouth. And I wasn't in the water. My ocean goddess and my gills couldn't breathe on land.

I started to struggle, rubbing my face against the linoleum, trying to catch the tape somehow.

"She's suffocating," the kid said.

"I know," Quinn said. "Looks good."

"No... she can't die like this."

"I know."

That was the moment I passed out.

I woke up in the water, upside down. I could feel the tug of weights on my wrists, along something pulling me from above. It took me a few seconds to realize that they were suspending me by a line in my own dive tank. Like a stuffed-mouthed bass they'd reeled in and wanted to keep fresh.

With the weights against my wrists, I knew that once they cut the line I'd be on my way to the bottom.

But I still had my goddess within me; I was breathing through her. The blood hadn't made her fight, but she hadn't left me, either.

Quinn and his son knew what I was. They were toying with me. They'd wanted to see it first-hand.

So they left me there, for at least ten minutes, before they pulled me back up.

"You're amazing," the kid said. With his heavy black gloves on again, he unwrapped the duct tape that covered my mouth.

"You won't scream," Quinn said. "You know better."

I nodded.

The kid carefully pulled the towel from my mouth. I wondered why he was so worried about being gentle all of a sudden.

"What if I told you that we'd be willing to let you go?" Quinn asked.

I didn't want to answer. I didn't want to say the wrong thing.

"Do you want to live, Vanessa?" Quinn asked.

"I do," I said. "Please."

"Don't do this," the kid said. "Don't toy with her."

"Toy with me?" I asked.

"He's not going to let you go. Obviously."

"Shut your yap, Conan."

"No, Dad. Let's just kill her and get it over with."

"I'm willing to be toyed with a little longer," I said. "I've got time."

The kid pulled out the duct tape and ripped off another strip.

"Please don't," I said. "I won't scream."

He taped over the back of my neck. He did it again with a second piece.

My gills were covered.

"Now you'll get the chance to drown," Quinn said.

Suddenly the thought of drowning terrified me, more than anything else. It wasn't something I'd even thought about before. "Wolves don't drown their prey," I said. "Can't you just do that heart-ripping thing?"

"There's only one way to kill an ocean goddess. She must die in the water. Otherwise she might find another body to use."

"Why does it matter if she does? You can just kill that one."

"Don't be stupid. It's the goddess who must die before she starts to kill."

"Come on," I said. "It's not like I'm going to kill anyone." I was lying, of course. If my wrists and ankles hadn't been taped I certainly would have given it my best try. "Please... I'm not going to kill anyone."

"We'd like to keep it that way," Quinn said. He turned to his son. "Stuff her mouth and push her in."

"I want to test something out," the kid said.

He didn't bother with the hand towel. He simply gave me a shove.

The weights pulled me down as I hit the water. There was slack in the line tied to my ankles and I kept sinking. I sank right to the bottom.

I opened my eyes and looked out through the plexiglass of the tank. There was nothing to see, no one around, no light in the dark night.

Unless Quinn and Conan changed their mind, I was going to drown and my goddess with me.

_Breathe._

I didn't understand.

_Just breathe._

I opened my mouth and sucked in the water. As clean as I thought my tank was, the water still tasted like feet.

As the water rushed down my throat I felt my lungs take a breath.

I exhaled through my mouth. And then I took another breath.

After a few minutes I felt my legs being pulled up towards the surface.

They were going to want me to be dead.

I felt the pulling stop, and I started to drift back down to the bottom. I twisted my head and looked up, and I saw someone else in the tank with me.

I was pretty sure it was Quinn. And the red mist spilling out from his head was something I was pretty sure about, too.

Quinn wasn't moving.

The pulling started again, and I tried not to move as I was slowly lifted towards the surface. If Quinn was dead, that didn't tell me anything about his son, whether or not he was the one pulling me out.

Maybe it was the police, or my uncle, or Horny Rich hoping that someone had finally adapted lobster traps for human women. But it was probably Conan, and I wasn't sure how I was going to keep him from killing me in some other way.

I was pulled out on the wooden platform, legs first. I felt the weights being removed from my wrists.

"Are you alright?" It was the kid.

I nodded. "Did you just kill your father?"

"I didn't want him to kill you. I don't want you to get hurt."

"You just tried to drown me. That would've hurt."

"No... I didn't." He sounded genuinely upset. "I kept count. Six minutes. You were underwater in the bathtub for at least ten."

"You taped over my gills, you idiot."

"I took a chance. Looks like I made a good bet."

I saw my baseball bat, lying on the ground near the ladder. There was blood, of course; I'd expected there to be blood. What surprised me was that the bat was there at all.

"How did you manage to sneak that bat up here?"

"No sneaking required. That was Dad's Plan B for you."

"No heart getting ripped out of my chest?"

"He was probably being dramatic. He usually uses a rock or a heavy branch."

"Not very wolf-like," I said.

"Don't worry... he was still going to bite you and all that."

"Why the hell would he want to do that?"

"That's what the spirit wants. That's what my spirit wants me to do to you right now. He wants to taste your flesh."

I knew it was just a matter of time before his spirit won out and made me his next nibble; this was the same kid who couldn't peep on a bathing lady without pulling down his pants.

I wanted to pull back from him, towards the ladder, but my wrists and ankles were still bound. I waited for his next poor attempt at a choke-out.

"Don't worry," he said, "I'm not going to hurt you, Vanessa."

"Then untie me."

"I can't. I... I can't take that chance. Not yet."

"Not yet?"

He nodded. "Not until I know I can trust you."

"Why the hell would I ever trust you?" I asked. I wondered if I should have thought things out a little before saying that.

"I love you, Vanessa."

"That's good to know."

He knelt down and picked up the towel and the roll of duct tape.

"What are you doing?" I asked.

"Until I can trust you."

I heard my goddess whispering to me.

_Taste his flesh._

I could feel the urge within me.

"Wait," I said. "What do we want to do about your father? We can't just leave him here."

"I'll put him under the trailer. In the same spot he meant for you."

"He's pretty waterlogged. You may need some help."

"Not yet," he said. "Not until I can trust you."

He stepped closer with the towel and the tape.

I threw myself towards him with my mouth open to his neck. I crunched down as hard as I could into his skin, tasting the metal in his blood.

And then I felt her rise to the surface.

I opened my eyes to find the bones and blood of the younger spirit wolf lying on the platform of my dive tank. I kicked them into the water as though that would make them disappear.

I knew I'd have to fish them out.

I started the fire in the woods, only a few dozen yards from The Wolfman's trailer. It had been a dry summer, so it was no surprise to anyone that a careless cigarette could cause such damage.

Once the flames had reached the trailer's propane tank it was all over for The Wolfman; apparently he'd been in the trailer with his son when the explosion happened.

No one else was hurt, thank god.

My uncle took the insurance and shut down the park; he knew that there wasn't any money left in the place. We all crossed The Bridge and went home.

I don't dive for pearls anymore. There are some in the lake, from the freshwater mussels that you'll find almost everywhere in L'Anse Bay, but that's not what I'm meant to do.

Most nights you'll find me walking the woods that stretch from the tip of Keweenaw Peninsula to somewhere in Wisconsin. I carry my bat and I listen to the whispers, and I wait for the dark spirits.

One day I'll find another one, and I'll know to swing the bat and take my bite.

It's a part of me now.

Born Again At Granny's Cave

**IT STARTED** in her chest, right near her heart. The flames spread quickly. Within seconds her entire body from her hair to her toes was burning up in front of me.

I hadn't known what was happening at the time. There'd been no lighter fluid or gasoline, no exploding boilers or burning SUVs... Kara had just been lying there in my arms. The shaking had stopped and her eyes had turned glassy, and I'd just realized that I'd lost her.

And then she caught on fire.

I'm no expert, but I'm pretty sure that Granny's Cave is a shithole by design; god-awful music, dark wood panels on the wall that make you feel like your trapped inside a giant tree... I think they do it all on purpose, some way of getting you to drink a little more of their eight dollar draughts.

If it hadn't been for Callum and his baseless optimism I would've been halfway home to East Van and the comfort of my neatly-categorized porn folders. But I decided to stay, even though there weren't that many women around. The place was mostly packed full of guys with edgy piercings and poorly-placed tattoos, wearing those skinny guy t-shirts I've never had a legitimate reason to wear.

"Nice talent, eh, Lanny?" Callum said as we circled, checking out every woman in the room.

What I'd seen so far was nothing I wanted. All I saw were girls so nasty they looked like they lived and worked in the sewer. You can't just take those kinds of women home and shove them in the shower, hoping that once they towel off they'll be good as new; they'll always have a little bit of grime left on them.

"Most of these girls are too young for us," I said, not bothering to mention that they were probably too drug-addled and disease-ridden for us as well.

Callum grinned, immune to my doubts and to basic common sense. "Confidence is everything."

He nodded towards a couple of girls talking together by the vintage cig machine; even the girls took notice, throwing smiles our way that didn't seem altogether mocking.

"They're into us already," he said.

He marched right over to them as I followed behind, more anxious about being left behind than I was about making an ass of myself.

Callum claimed his target, the ultrathin blonde with hoop earrings and a stud in her nose.

That left me with the spindly brunette. She looked nothing like my ex-wife and I considered that a plus. She had all the markings of a girl who's been called plain a lot: a purple streak in her hair, an ironic wool beret tilted to one side, the standard thick black glasses with the thinnest lenses known to science... and she looked like she hadn't eaten in a week.

"I'm Lanny," I said.

She gave me a cute little smirk.

I wanted to spontaneously combust.

"You girls going to school?" Callum asked, making it more obvious that we are old and they are not.

"UBC," the blonde replied in a way that wasn't at all convincing. "You old guys remember going to school?"

Callum didn't skip a beat. "I'm a student, too... going for my doctorate. Architecture." He'd learned long ago never to tell women what he really did for a living; the only girls who are into funeral directors come with some pretty heavy baggage.

"So a doctorate," she said, giving a little roll of her eyes. "Student debt is so very sexy. Tell me all about your part-time job at Burger King."

Callum laughed and kept going, and the blonde kept digging into him; she hadn't pulled out the bear spray so I guess you'd call it flirting.

I felt someone grab my hand. "You're married," the spindly brunette said, holding up my wedding band as evidence.

"No," I said, "I'm just depressed. I'm one of those idiots who really thought she'd stay married to me."

"Stick of butter'll get that ring right off."

"Oh, really?" I said in a way she must have liked.

She held up her over-sized purple-red handbag. "I don't have any butter in my purse, but I do have bolt cutters if you can trust my precision."

"What kind of person keeps bolt cutters in her purse?"

"This kind of person," she said, giving me the kind of smile you see on TV right before people hook up. "My name's Kara."

"Like Kara Thrace," I replied with immediate regret.

"Who?"

"Uh... from _Battlestar Galactica_."

She gave me a laugh. "Don't worry," she said. "I still think you're cute."

I bought Kara a shot of tequila and did my best to clean off a couch to sit on. As she sat down beside me she brushed up against my side in a way that couldn't be mistaken for an accident.

It was all pretty textbook so far; I felt like I was on my way to waking up in a bathtub full of ice.

"You're not a student," I said. "I can tell."

"Dropped out a long time ago."

"Do you work around here?"

"I guess I'd say I'm a writer. So far it hasn't paid much."

"That sucks," I said. I couldn't think of anything better. I wasn't about to ask her what kind of depressing jobs she'd taken to make ends meet, not that I could picture her wearing a hairnet or answering phones. Well, maybe answering phone calls from pervy old men...

"I think you can tell that Ashley and I aren't like the other girls. I'm not sure you should be talking to me."

"I'm a thirty-five-year-old divorced man with nothing to say. You probably shouldn't be talking to me."

"You're only thirty five?"

"That hurts a little," I said. "You're wondering how I could have gotten so damned fat in just three and a half decades?"

"Don't put yourself down. It's not attractive."

"What is attractive?"

"Smiling and nodding. I'll tell you random things about my life and my cat and my favourite metal bands, nothing the least bit interesting. And you'll pretend to like it." She leaned in and whispered into my ear. "Then you'll take me back to your place, we'll have awkward but reasonably enjoyable sex and after that I'll overstay my welcome by a couple of months."

"Sounds good," I said. It did sound good.

And she was pretty spot on about the sex.

Kara and Ashley stayed over for a few days. Ashley left on Sunday night after getting to know Callum well enough to make an informed decision; Kara never really left.

She did leave once, though, to bring over her cat.

After a little prodding, she borrowed my laptop to show me some of her writing. It was like nothing I'd seen before, words both beautiful and sad... it wasn't pretentious or anything, but it was definitely deeper than I was used to, a story about the past that read as though she'd been there.

All I could say to her was that she had talent; she nodded and smiled, and I could see that my opinion didn't really matter.

But I was still glad she'd shared it with me.

She gave me a hug and took her purse into the bathroom.

I decided to keep reading, looking for some kind of clue why she seemed as drawn to me as I was to her.

She didn't come out for over twenty minutes, and when she did she was different, restless but relaxed, and her pupils had shrunk down until they looked like little emeralds shining back at me. She sat down on the couch and smiled at me, like she was having the best day of her life.

I think that was the first time Kara shot heroin at my place. I wasn't happy about it but I didn't want to send her away. She was already the best thing that had ever happened to me.

It took less than a week for Kara to bring a client home to my place. He came in and she made him take a shower, both of us waiting on the couch and not really talking about what was going on.

I was trying to be open minded.

At first I'd thought it was an attempt to spice up our week-old love life, and I was flattered if a little confused. But after he came out of the shower the guy handed me a wad of cash and Kara told me to wait in the bathroom with her cat, and I tried to figure out if the heroin use would have been the right place to draw the line.

She did let me keep some of the money.

And despite it all, that she was a metalhead heroin addict, that she usually forgot to flush the toilet even after taking a dump, that she often had sex with strangers for money... despite it all, I was pretty sure I was falling in love.

It didn't feel like the last time, when I'd bought a ring because I thought that's what you did after two years of living together with someone you didn't hate most of the time. With Kara it felt like some kind of tropical disease, where I just had to be around her and know everything about her. And hopefully not the kind of disease where my organs are cooked from the inside out.

It's funny how falling in love can feel so different the second time.

Kara and I were married three weeks later at an eco-resort on Vancouver Island. Callum had suggested we all drive out to Kootenay Lake instead, but I'm pretty sure it was just another attempt for him to show me that house built from leftover bottles of embalming fluid.

He was my best man, which was no surprise after twelve years of friendship and always having each others' back, close enough to be honest with each other but never quite crossing the line into a devil's threesome. I don't think there's anything we wouldn't do for one another; when you find a friend like that you keep him no matter what.

Kara made Ashley maid of honor with a little less ceremony, and I had the feeling that her friend was more a placeholder than anything else. But it gave Callum and Ashley the chance for a second regrettable fling together and saved us from buying them thank you gifts.

Kara let me stick with the ring I already had from before, telling me she wasn't overly sentimental and that there was no reason to waste money on trinkets when there'd be plenty of black tar to pay for.

The wedding went well, and the day after the four of us went up to MacMillan Provincial Park and played hide and seek in the big trees. It didn't take long for Ashley to get lost; Callum cheerfully advised us to just leave her out there and head back to the resort for dinner.

Kara eventually found her, quite a ways off the trail, in a hole in the trunk of a giant Douglas fir, one that was big enough to hold two or three junkies of average girth. She was heating a spoon with her cigarette lighter and wasn't the least bit concerned about cleanliness.

Kara shook her head. "That girl'll be dead soon," she said. Her lips pursed into a strange sort of smile. "Sounds like a nice change of pace, actually."

"That's not funny," I said. I grabbed her arm and squeezed. "You need to take care of yourself."

"Don't get all mushy, asshole." She frenched me with extra tongue.

By that point Ashley had finished shooting up and it was time to join Callum in the task of dragging a decidedly fucked-up Ashley over to his Mitsubishi.

After we dropped her off at what she claimed was her parents' house in North Vancouver, I never saw Ashley again. We didn't mention her anymore and to be honest I'm not sure Kara ever gave her another thought; I guess to her Ashley seemed dead already.

I'm not sure why she decided it had to be that way.

Callum moved out of the apartment. He and I had argued briefly about who got to stay, but my argument was boosted by the fact that my name was the only one on the lease.

I found out quickly that I was allergic to Kara's cat, but luckily she knew a guy who had suspiciously cheap allergy tablets for sale over in Fraserlands. I found with practice that every fifth tablet or so caused me to black out for a few hours, so I set my alarm to take them each morning at 3:30 in order to give myself a little wiggle room.

Things were great, mostly. Living together was great, the sex was great... but the drugs were becoming a problem.

I'd originally thought Kara needed heroin like I needed my Irish coffee, just a hit to get through the day. But she was using more and more often as time went by.

She started bringing home new clients, guys who looked like they couldn't really afford the $350, guys so shady I became convinced that I should start bringing my tire iron in from the car. Pretty soon she wasn't making enough money to cover the drugs, and after a month or so I was starting to have trouble making rent.

"I think it's becoming a problem," I told her after her scuzziest client yet had left, and as she grabbed her over-sized handbag from its drawer in the nightstand.

"I know," she said.

"I think we need to get you some help."

"I'll handle it."

She opened her purse, took out her spoon and began to swab it.

"How come you never ask me to join you?" I asked.

"You shouldn't use drugs," she said as she gingerly took out the sticky dark powder.

"Are you joking?"

"It's not a joke." She grabbed her syringe and squirted the water, and then gave the mix a little stir with the plunger. "I don't ever want to see you using. There's nothing good about this."

"Then why do you do it?"

"My god you're an idiot. It's called being a drug addict, douchebag."

I watched as she loaded up the needle and injected into the freshly swabbed skin on her arm. She took a deep breath and gave me a little smile.

"It's a few hours of Jesus between my thighs," she said. "After that it's the worst thing a person can ever live through. You know... until they die."

"I want to help you."

"I'm headed out to Granny's Cave. Don't wait up."

"I want to come with you."

"You're bad for business," she said.

"You're not serious, Kara. You're not going to solicit random guys at the bar."

"And how did we meet?"

I tried to understand what she was going through, the opiates coursing through her body... but she was being such an asshole.

"What the hell are you talking about?" I asked, straightening my spine like my therapist had once told me to do.

"Everybody pays... we're just using the barter system."

"Fuck you. That's not what marriage is about."

"Says the guy who's only been married twice. Take it from me, Lanny... that's all marriage is about."

Kara turned and left the apartment, and I'm sure someone who didn't know her would've never realized she was on something; hell, I hadn't known she was high back on the night we first met.

I waited long enough to know she'd have already caught the Sixteen before I followed her downtown. By the time I found a place to park and walked the fifteen minutes to Granny's I saw her near the front of the line. I stayed at the back so she wouldn't notice me, and within ten minutes she was in.

I waited for almost an hour before my turn, not bad for synthpunk night. I checked the dance floor first but she wasn't there.

I wandered through the rest of Granny's but couldn't find Kara anywhere. I did a second loop, hoping that maybe I'd missed her the first time, or maybe I'd see Ashley or maybe even Callum rehearsing his latest pickup line, but I didn't find anyone I knew. Granny's was just a sea of people cooler than me, grinding and bumping and ignoring my existence.

I checked the men's bathroom, and then stood awkwardly outside the ladies', asking a few of the less threatening women if they'd seen a spindly girl with thick black glasses and dark brown hair with a purple streak. That got me nowhere so I took a chance and shoved my way through the ladies room door.

And there she was, leaning up against the sink with her forehead touching the mirror. She was rolling her head against the glass. I couldn't tell if she was having trouble pulling her head up or if she just liked the feeling of a scratched and lipstick-smeared bathroom mirror against her skin.

"Kara," I said. "What's going on?"

She didn't answer. Some of the other women in the bathroom were staring, watching us like we were putting on a one-act play.

"Goddamn it!" I screamed. "Did anyone call an ambulance?"

They all looked away. I put both hands on her shoulders and tried to pull her up. She fell back against me and for a moment I thought I'd drop her.

I felt her body start to jerk, and I lowered her down to the floor. Her eyes were open but I wasn't sure she was still with me.

"Kara," I said. "What happened?"

She didn't respond.

"Kara... I love you. Please..."

I fumbled with my cell phone, eventually fingering the numbers to 911, and as I waited for an operator Kara closed her eyes.

I knew she wasn't going to make it.

"I'm so sorry," I said. I looked around the women's washroom, hoping that someone would know what to do, but by that point we were alone. I don't think anyone bothered to tell the bouncers. And I guess no one wanted to be there when she died.

I told the operator who finally answered what I thought had happened, that we needed an ambulance, that I was pretty sure I was losing her.

I can't describe how it felt, seeing her like that, knowing that she'd finally gone too far, that she'd put in too much junk for her body to take.

I stared into her eyes, hoping she'd come out of it.

But she wasn't there. Kara was gone.

I felt a tickle of heat on her skin and I thought it was just some part of me trying to keep the warmth from leaving her. But then the skin started to smoke and then to burn, and I had to pull myself back from the heat.

I laid down a few feet away, watching as the fire grew, orange and white flames swallowing Kara and nothing else in that bathroom, the heat nearly searing my skin. The fire roared and then it stopped.

The smoke began to clear.

And Kara was still there, unburnt and completely bare, her clothes burned to nothing, but her beautiful eyes and her beautiful freckles were there, and her dark brown hair, looking soft and shiny, missing its purple streak.

And then she opened her eyes and looked at me.

"I'm okay, Lanny," she said, reaching out to me with her hand. "But you look like shit."

Nothing had happened to me but I could barely move.

She pulled off my shirt and dressed herself in it, trying to pull it down far enough to reach to her thighs.

Kara helped me back to the parking garage, my arm draped over her shoulder; my knees felt like they'd been shattered.

And then she drove us home. And as she steered the car down Hastings Street, she told me what she was.

She was like a phoenix, she said, only one of her in the entire world, born and reborn and never dying. I figured she'd feel like a god, but all she kept telling me was how the loneliness settles in for forever.

"I've been left behind more times than I can count," she said. "Falling in love and always losing it. It leaves a mark." She looked down at the floor. "So I guess it's no wonder... I've shot up... I've filled up on gin and turpentine... I've mixed nightshade into my wine and spent the day seeing visions of Saint Jerome. I can never die, Lanny... do you know how terrible that is?"

"I can't know... and I think it'll be a while before they figure out a way for the rest of us to live forever," I said. "I doubt I'll be around long enough for that. Maybe that makes me lucky."

"You _are_ lucky," she said, tears running down her face.

Kara and I stayed together after that night. Everything seemed different then, with no more heroin and no more clients dropping by. I used up the rest of my vacation time and we spent eight days straight just laying together in bed like John and Yoko. She told me more about her past lives and the people she'd lost; for my end of the conversation I mostly talked about movies I'd seen.

We decided after a while that Kara should go back to her writing. I joked that to make some quick cash she should dig out her old manuscripts and just add a shitload of zombies. She decided on writing something new about sparkly vampires and I chose to bite my tongue.

I was happy, but I could see that Kara wasn't. I could see that for her, nothing had changed.

By the time my vacation was over, Kara hadn't done anything, no writing, no drugs. She was just there, like she was waiting until I left for work so she could crawl under the blankets and weep.

"Is it withdrawal?" I asked her.

"I love that you're stupid," she said. "My old body was hooked on heroin. My new body's free and clear."

"It's not your body I'm talking about."

"I'll snap out of it." She stared at me for a moment; she knew I didn't believe her. "Really... I promise."

I wasn't surprised to see that she wasn't there when I came home from work. She'd left all of her things behind, including her cat, but that was no guarantee that she'd come back.

I sat on the wall of the bathtub with my iPad and waited for Kara to come home.

She returned with a nervous energy, giving me half of a hug before she went into the kitchen and started pulling food out of the refrigerator.

"What are you making?" I asked at the combination of ketchup, lettuce and expired eggnog on the kitchen counter.

"I'm cleaning the fridge."

"Don't clean the fridge. Come and talk to me."

She left her cleaning behind and threw herself onto the couch. "This place is boring," she said. "You're boring."

"I don't get this... I've never seen you like this." I wanted to know what she'd taken, what she was on, but I was too scared to ask.

"I'm not a junkie," she said from her place on the couch. "That's what's important to you, isn't it? I'm just like any other girl. Bored to death by this _squalish_ little apartment."

" _Squalish?_ "

"It's a word. Look it up, asshole." She pulled a crooked cigarette out from her pocket and waved it at me. "Light it," she said, kicking her legs on the cushion.

"You don't smoke."

"Come on."

I took the cigarette from her. The rolling paper was crinkled and wet, stained in brownish yellow. "What is this crap? Some kind of drug?"

"It's all legal," she said.

"That doesn't mean it's safe. Please, Kara, tell me what this is."

She started to laugh. "It's embalming fluid. I wanted to see what all the fuss was about, seeing as almost everyone I've ever loved had the chance to try it years ago."

"You smoked one already?"

"It's wearing off."

"You can't keep doing this," I said. "Please..." I lowered myself beside her on the couch as best I could and wrapped my arms around her. Her whole body was shivering and I could feel her heart pounding. I was overwhelmed and I began to cry.

"Don't," she said. She planted a sloppy kiss on my cheek.

"I'm sorry... I'm just worried about you."

She sighed. "I'm sorry, too." She started to climb off the couch so I got out of her way.

She stood up in front of me and took off her shirt.

"This is me," she said as she pulled down her pants. "This is your wife. I've been alive longer than anyone else, but I still suck at it."

We laid in bed together; she wanted more, but it didn't feel right. We held each other and eventually she came down enough to fall asleep. I watched her for over an hour as she slept.

I didn't regret marrying her. Or falling in love with her. I didn't regret a thing.

"I want to die," Kara said.

I was just about to leave for work when she said it, and she sounded for a moment like a teenager who'd just been grounded. But that wasn't Kara; Kara meant it.

"You want to start over again?" I asked.

"No... I want to stop starting over. I want to be dead. I want you to rip out my heart and feed it to a goddamned grizzly bear. I want to get this over with."

"Would that even work? The bear, I mean?"

She shrugged. "I doubt it. My heart would probably just start burning up somewhere inside its large intestine... you know... kind of like Mexican food." She smiled at her own joke. "I think the only way to stop me from being born again would be to flash freeze me like a salmon."

And that's when it came to me.

It felt strange; I wanted to help her with what she wanted more than anything but I didn't want to lose her.

"Would you really do it?" I asked. "If you found a way to die, would you?"

"I've had plenty of life," she said quietly. "I'm ready for something else."

I gave her a kiss on her forehead. And then I gave Callum a call, wondering just how far our friendship could stretch.

Callum didn't believe me at first when I told him about Kara, and I think that somehow made me feel a little better. It's not like I had any proof.

We were walking together along the trail by the marina, watching people jogging and rollerblading and getting on with their lives. I'd told him the story; I'd told him everything, and then we just continued on in silence for almost a half hour.

That's how long it took for him to come around.

"Would you really let her go?" he asked me. "I mean, if somehow we actually had the balls to do this."

"It's what she wants. I think that's worth more than anything else."

"There are other things to try... counselling or something."

"She doesn't want that. She doesn't want anything else."

Callum gave me a quick pat on the shoulder. "I'll only do it if it's really what you want."

I nodded. "It's what I want."

We turned around a few minutes later, walking back without much talking. I didn't really want to keep on about it.

As for what I wanted for Kara, I'm sure Callum knew I was lying. But he didn't call me on it.

Kara and I met Callum a few nights later, after his staff had gone home. He didn't look at all happy to see us; I knew I was asking a lot.

"Are you sure you're okay with this?" I asked him.

"I have to be," he said. "You need my help so here we are." He looked over to Kara and gave her a nervous smile. "It's non-toxic. That way you'll know you're not poisoning the earth."

Kara didn't say a word or even nod. She just stared at him blankly.

"That's good," I said, trying to smile. I wrapped my arm around my beautiful wife and gave her a squeeze. "Are you sure you want to do this?" I asked her.

She nodded.

I looked over to Callum. "So it needs to happen... before..."

"I know," Callum said. "I have ether for that."

I tensed up a little. "Will it hurt?"

Kara pulled at my hand. I looked over to see her slowly shaking her head at me. I wanted to think she was telling me to forget the whole thing, to take her home and just hold her. But all she really wanted was for me to shut up.

He led us through a door into a tiled room. On one wall was a shower and a shelf with some glass and plastic bottles. On the other side was a long metal table, and next to that a red couch; both looked out of place.

"This is usually where I wash up," Callum said. "We'll do it in here if that's okay. I felt it was nicer than..."

"It's very nice," Kara said. "Thank you." She sat down on the couch and took off her shoes.

"Do you guys need a couple minutes?" Callum asked.

Kara shook her head no.

I kept my mouth shut.

Callum put on his white latex gloves. He took a clear plastic bottle from the shelf and brought it over to Kara along with a large white cloth.

She lowered herself down until she was fully reclined, her head resting on a small pillow.

Callum carefully poured the ether into a glass measuring cup that looked like it belonged in a kitchen. He then dropped the cloth into the cup to soak.

"Don't breathe any in, Lanny," he said.

"What about you?" I asked.

"I'm less sensitive to it after all these years. I've been on a lot of dates." He seemed to catch his bad timing. "Sorry..."

"Thank you for doing this, Callum," Kara said. "I really appreciate it."

Callum nodded. He knelt down beside the couch and held the cloth up to her face. "Breathe deeply," he said.

I held her hand as she took it in, three deep breaths before she closed her eyes.

Callum held the cloth to her face a little longer before pulling it away.

"You're doing okay?" he asked me.

"I'm fine."

"Good... help me get her onto the table."

I helped him move Kara, and I helped him with the chemicals, both of us in gowns and gloves.

Callum explained to me that everything he'd use was biodegradable, even the flame retardant he'd gotten from his cousin in Coquitlam. He explained that it wouldn't be like regular embalming, that Kara would be more like a medical cadaver; he wouldn't have enough time to drain her blood and there was really no need to make it look good. Her body should be preserved for decades or longer, her heart kept cold and still.

My heart was already starting to eat itself.

I asked him how he knew it would work and he told me there was no way of knowing; I felt silly for having asked. There was no way to know for sure. I tried not to imagine Kara waking up again, staring at me, angry that the hope I'd given her had turned out to be useless.

Once Callum made the injection I had to leave the room; I didn't want to see it. I sat in the front room of the mortuary on a matching red couch.

I wanted her body to catch fire on that table; maybe then I'd have her for good.

Callum found me later; he said it had been several hours, but I couldn't be sure.

"Is she still in there?" I asked. "Is she... gone?"

Callum sighed. "I don't know... I think so, but I'm not sure. How long did it take before?"

"Minutes..."

"I think she's gone."

I stood up and shook his hand. He gave me a hug.

"Thanks, man," I said. "I'll never forget this."

"I'm glad you came to me, Lanny. I'm glad we could help her."

I didn't understand why he was so damned glad about everything.

I just felt lost.

We brought the hearse onto the ferry out of Horseshoe Bay; I tried to ignore the stares from camera-toting tourists.

We drove her to MacMillan and the giant fir trees at Cathedral Grove. We waited until the sun had set and the lot had emptied.

We took out the casket made of cardboard and cloth, and together Callum and I carried Kara into the woods. We found the place, that large Douglas Fir far off the trail, with a hole in its trunk just big enough to bury the love of my life.

After Callum had gone and come back with the shovels, we dug a little place for her in the earth that lined the floor of the hole, digging it deeper and deeper until there was no dirt left, and the shoots of the trunk came together again.

We took her out of the casket and laid her there, curled into a ball and wrapped in several sheets of plastic. We covered her with a couple feet of dirt and layered over the area with needles and some wayward leaves and grass.

I had a feeling she'd be safe there, away from the trail, buried on an island that had no coyotes to dig her out. Buried there until she lives again.

I wonder if by then they'll have found a way for someone like me to live forever; Kara wouldn't have wanted that, but that's because she's always been alone with that life, the one and only phoenix in all the world. She's the only one to have lived on for what seems like forever after losing everyone who mattered.

Maybe the next time she wakes up I'll be here waiting for her. And there will finally be someone else who understands just what that's like.

###  Prologue from Book One of Regan Wolfrom's Post-Apocalyptic Series, After The Fires Went Out

### Coming to eBook and Paperback on January 31, 2013

There was a moment right after the fires went out when I thought Fiona and I were the only people left for a thousand miles around. It looked as though the whole world had burned, the air around us so hot that it felt like even the water of Lillabelle Lake was close to boiling. I had trouble imagining that anyone else could have survived.

She was laying beside me on the beach, where the rocky sand was still hot like a stovetop from the fire. Her eyes were open but she didn't really seem to see me; I think she was still in shock.

I didn't know her name then. I barely remembered Fiona and her parents from the sea of faces at the town meetings, back when the sky was dark night and day and it felt like we were all just sitting around and waiting to see the sun again, back when I was the big man around here for some reason. I didn't know how sweet and smart and funny she is; she was just some pretty fourteen-year-old girl who reminded me of the daughter I'd lost, and who was now just as alone as I was.

That was the moment when I promised the universe and Cassy that I'd take care of Fiona, no matter what. I thought I might be the only person left in the world to take care of her.

But it didn't take long for us to realize that we weren't the only ones left out here; we weren't even the only people who climbed out of Lillabelle Lake that day.

That didn't make my promise any less important.

For more information, please visit: <http://www.reganwolfrom.com/after-the-fires-went-out/>

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Regan lives in Winnipeg, Canada with his wife, two children, and enough animals to bleed through six layers of carpet.

You can find out more about Regan at his website: **www.reganwolfrom.com**

