The Beautiful Dead (29 page)

“What do you
wanna do later?” Gill asked me, but I was studying Sascha across the room,
wondering how I’d look in his arms instead of that ugly Tina.

In the limo, I
was telling my friends how much better my old limo was by the ocean, how much
cleaner and longer it was. They all wanted to go to the lake house, and I was
thrilled because I didn’t want this night to end.

My parents are
gonna be so, so, so angry.

On the creaky
porch, Gill tried to kiss me. I could see my reflection in a nearby window,
illuminated by bright, blinding moonlight, and I studied how my face looked as
he kissed me. I made sure my hair was never out of place.

“Let’s go to
the lake,” he whispered in my ear.

I was so, so
cold, but I swallowed myself up in the warmth of his thick jacket and I said, “Alright.”

We didn’t make
it to the lake. In a little clearing of woods, we laid down in the snow and I
felt his weight on top of me, holding me, opening me.

My fur coat
opening, I breathed hard.

My dress
opening, I breathed harder and harder.

Our breath
like a fire in the icy air, he pressed his lips into me like the pillow I’d pressed
to my face hours ago, drowning out the sound of my breath, of my life.

Something
about my dad’s words, about a poison of the soul, and I put two hands to Gill’s
chest.

Something
about a puppy I never loved, how it was hit by a car right in front of my
something-year-old eyes and I barely flinched, something about a poison and I’m
pushing Gill off me, though he barely moves.

Opening me,
opening me up.

Something about
the way mom looked at me.

You did this
to yourself, Claire.

He tears my
red dress, tears it again, opening me up.

Something
about my lying, something about where I am right now, something about no one
knowing where I am and how everything I am is an ugly, ugly thing.

Something
about my hair … and my dress …

About my
emerald earrings that aren’t mine, and …

About my only
friend Bethany I threw away, and …

I pushed and I
pushed Gill and I pushed until I could finally say, “I don’t want this, get off
me, stop.”

What am I
doing?

“Stop it,” I
said, and Gill was off me, and Gill looked at me, he looked down at me and he
was confused.

I told him he
was poisoning me.

He called me
something and I told him to go away. He fulfilled my wish and left me all alone
in the woods.

Something
about the last thing my mom said to me.

Something
about making things right.

“I changed my
mind,” I tell her, but she’s nowhere.

I start
walking faster, picking up pace. I watch my breath billowing out before me as I
break into a sprint, the fog of my own breaths wrapping around me like a prison.

“I changed my
mind,” I call out, because I want her to hear me, but she’s not there.

I’m running
now, breaking free from the woods, my voice shaking as I squeeze out the words,
“Mom, I’m so sorry, I changed my mind.” I’m running and my fur coat is nowhere
to be found, and my dress is hanging off me and I’m so, so, so cold.

I’m so cold I
don’t realize where I am.

Snap.

What I’m
walking over right now.

Crack.

Something
about her wanting to hug me.

I’m so, so
cold.

“Mom,” I
whisper.

Then fall
through the ice.

C H A P T E R – T W E N T Y

The first
thing you need to do is, no matter who you were, let go.

The Deathless
King slides off the end of my steel weapon like a wisp of hair, dropping away
from sight.

I stare ahead.
I am unfeeling. I am a series of bones and joints and two frozen eyes.

A blade.

What you must
do now, no matter what you’ve done already, is forgive.

The corpse of
my mother still dropping, twirling in the writhing, snaky air, her robes
fluttering about her like the wings of the angel of death. A silent
thunderstorm descending into the shattering mists.

What you must
see, no matter what you actually see, is not who you were or who you are.

It’s who you
aren’t.

I’m not sure I
expected this to be my reaction to my Waking Dream. Perhaps I didn’t with all my
amble thought once consider that it was all, every moment of this Second Life,
linked so impenitently to my First one. Mad Malory, my mother, her mind aflame
by the memory of her own First Life—her memory of me. Her inability to cope.
Her descent into madness, into despair.

I am the
seedling of Deathless. My mother, its King.

Already I’ve
removed myself from the cliff, but this time with no help from a pale-faced
prince of death. With one foot and then the other foot, I walk through decayed
plain and wood, returning home once more. But for the first time, I approach it
knowing everything.

Knowledge is
not power. Knowledge is a prison. And with it now, I envy every ignorant soul
in this city.

It was just a
split second, the King’s impaled body hanging on my sword. Just one split
second for her, but an entire lifetime invaded my consciousness.

In one short
and soundless instant.

I pass through
the gates with the Judge’s great blade still in my hand, and I see the faces of
these innocents, but I can’t distinguish which ones are living and which ones
are not. With my Life inside me now, I guess they all look Human. I don’t need
to ask anyone what’s happened, it’s written on their faces.

We won.

There’s no
telling how I get there, but I’m in front of the tavern suddenly and there’s
Ann telling me she’s glad the Deathless are gone. “Wasn’t even a proper death
we gave them,” she points out with a smirk. “Just so happens the convenience of
having a weakness to something as silly as steel made them drop to their knees.
If it weren’t for their little puppeteer. What’s with the glum face?”

“I’m not
glum,” I tell her. “Just …”

“I know,” she
agrees with a sigh. “Back to same old. It was almost more exciting when we had
the Deathless threatening our very existence. Now instead of imminent doom, all
I have to look forward to is another thrilling year at the high school.”

“Yes,” I agree
numbly. “And I have to look forward to the …” And I can’t think of anything.

“Oh!” Ann’s
eyes go wide. “You don’t even know!”

“Know what?”

She takes my
hand and pulls me down the street, around a corner, and into the squatty pink
building I know so unfortunately well. A dark-haired woman is seated on the
worktable with her slender back facing me. A very eager Marigold works on her,
reattaching the neck from what it looks like.

I’m a second
from saying hello when the dark-haired woman turns her face to look at me, and
I’m silenced.

“Hello,” she
says.

I’ve choked on
my own tongue. I can’t even make a word.

“Surprised?”
She smiles. Such a difference a smile makes compared to the scowl I’m so used
to seeing on her sharp, pointy face. “Guess I’m just … lucky.”

“Helena,” I
finally manage to say.

She gets up
from the table despite Marigold’s half-hearted protests, and gracelessly
staggers toward me, then stops, bracing herself against the wall. “Same head,
new body,” she explains, annoyed. “I don’t like these legs.”

“They’re the
best we have,” says Marigold. “I so wish you would’ve let me build you some
from scratch!”

“Could you
imagine, if I let her?” Helena whispers secretly to me, and I have to stifle a
laugh. “I’d look like a human tarantula. Winter.” She takes me by the
shoulders, looks deeply into my eyes. “I want you to know, I don’t blame you
for what happened at the Black Tower. You did what you had to do, and you were
braver, you were stronger, you were smarter than I’d ever dream a Raise of mine
could be. You are a true wonder.”

“I wouldn’t go
that far,” I say, looking away. I can almost fool myself into thinking I’m
blushing.

“And I knew
it,” she goes on, dismissing my remark, “at that moment in the tower, I knew
you were the answer. You were, and are, the only one who could’ve brought
freedom to us all. I never knew the power you possessed, and I may never in all
my existence understand it, but I, like every other soul in this town, owe you
my life.” She pulls me in, embracing me in the tightest hug.

“We don’t have
lives,” I say coyly.

“We do now,
Winter.”

Her uttering
of my name starts an unwelcome battle in my mind, a war in my heart, a clash of
galactic masses in my core that have everything to do with a New Life that I’ve
been made aware of. Winter, she calls me. I swear never to tell a soul about my
Old Life, never to recall it again for the rest of my Undead days. Except …

“It’s Claire,”
I whisper into her ear.

She doesn’t
react for a moment, staring off over my shoulder. Then her eyes find mine, and
she knows. And I know she knows. The world connects, and she sees the weight in
my eyes. Her alone, she understands that I left this city lighter than I
returned. Purged of the King, only to return with something so much worse.

“Thank you …
Winter.” And her eyes smile, and for all the pain that’s snaking through my
being, for all the inner battle that might never for all of time end, I feel a
wave of gratitude at her words.

After
reassuring Marigold that I’d be back to get a left arm, I leave to make my way
through the streets of victorious faces, my long steel sword dragging on the
ground behind me. So pleased everyone is to return to their peaceful lives, to
the strict and submissive Trenton way. So much happiness around me, so why can’t
I feel it?

“Winter of the
Second,” calls a proud voice as I enter the Square, and suddenly everyone is
looking in my direction, their faces lighting up. I spot the Mayor standing on
the Square stage, his happy face welcoming me toward it. “Winter of the Second,
come forth!”

I pass through
the crowd of happy faces, everyone parting to allow me this simple path to the stage.
I wish I could feel proud of it all, but I’m just a walking corpse today and
not much else.

“Up to the stage
and embrace your victory!”

The town hero,
I suppose I am, I ascend the little steps, again. I’m about to face the crowd,
again-again, when I notice that we are not alone on this platform.

Bound to the
stake is the slender, slackened form of Grimsky, his body hanging from the
tight ropes binding him in place. His eyeless face stares forth at the
nothingness, the nightmare, the infinity.

I gasp, taken
so dramatically by the sight of him. I can’t bring myself to say anything,
caught by how he looks, his awful, degraded state. Even after it all, I feel …

I feel
terrible for him.

“Winter of the
Second,” the Mayor bellows for the crowd’s benefit. “You have successfully rid
our city of the most vile of plagues, and returned peace to our peaceful kind. The
reign of the Deathless is at long last terminated. You are, in mine eyes, a true
and honored hero!”

I hear some
applause, but it is like the half-hearted hand-slaps of a tired joke on a lost
crowd. Even the people of Trenton it seems are clouded of spirit.

“You behold
the Blade of Judgment, brave girl!” he announces, indicating my weapon with a
demonstrative sweep of his hand. The Judge’s blade. The one that’s taken both
the lives of the Warlock and my mother. “And with it,” the Mayor goes on, “you
will serve the traitor Grimsky his final Judgment!”

I’m confused
for a second. I genuinely don’t get it. “Final Judgment?” I ask quietly.

It is not the
Mayor who answers me, but Grimsky himself. “He wishes you to end me.”

I stare at
Grim. Even the Square seems to have fallen silent, the restless shuffle of
bored, joyless citizens of Trenton growing still, anticipating the show the
Mayor wishes me to put on … This public execution of Grimsky.

“Please,”
Grimsky murmurs, but not to beg for his life. “Do it quickly. The citizens of
Trenton will be happy. The Mayor will be happy. And you … you will be free.”

The sword
feels so heavy in my one hand suddenly. I worry if I can even lift it above my
waist, one arm or both if I had them. All of my resolve, if I had any in the
first place, it’s dropped to the blighted earth.

The Judge
would be here delivering this Judgment, had she survived the quick wit of the
little puppeteer. Her final moment, her body twisting into ash and air before
my eyes … Her blade is now asking politely to end the life of a man I thought I
once loved.