The Beautiful Dead (5 page)

Am I
remembering me?

Then without
warning, a young man quickly slips into the bathroom and shuts the door behind
him, pressing his body flat against it.

I wasn’t
expecting this.

His panicked
eyes, his warm brown eyes, they find mine—and horror fills them at once. Why he
has this reaction at seeing me, I don’t know.

“You’re in the
ladies,” I decide to tell him.

He puts a
finger to his lips, signaling that I should be quiet. His hand is trembling.

“What’s so—?”
I start to ask, but his other hand goes to my mouth, silencing me at once.

His soft, warm
hand.

The violent
throws of bodies and glass continues for what feels like several minutes, and
then instantly falls silent. A single pair of footsteps crosses the tavern
floor as though pacing, one end of the tavern to the other, back and forth.

The man holding
his warm hand to my mouth, I notice how strong his arms look. His broad
shoulders from which the arms come. His face reflects a warmth that stirs
something deep in me, something I’d assumed was lost. His five-o’clock-shadowed
rosy cheeks, I’m shocked that any miracle from the squatty pink Refinery could
replicate them. Or his lush lips. A noteworthy job they did on this rugged man
I have to admit, even despite the odd circumstance. His soft watery eyes are
more aware than any I’ve seen yet. I watch his forehead screw up in
concentration as he silently presses an ear to the door, listening with all his
body.

Slowly, the
steps approach us. This guy’s grip on my mouth tightens so much, I have to
bring my own hand up to meet his. He seems to be holding his breath, squeezing
his eyes shut like he’s in pain. The mystery walker stops just short of the
door, then waits there as though he is listening too. An eternity seems to pass
before finally, the footsteps slowly draw away, growing fainter, fainter, then
gone at last.

He finally
lets go of my mouth and whispers his first words: “Are you going to eat me?”

Not the
sweetest first words I’ve heard. “What?”

“Are you going
to eat me?” he asks again.

“Seriously?”

After studying
my face doubtfully for a while, he seems to relax. “Okay, then.”

And without
further explanation, he swings open the door and peers outside. Deciding the
coast is clear I guess, he steps out of the bathroom. When I reluctantly
follow, I find the tavern littered with skulls and bones of the bodies it once
peacefully occupied. None of them stir. This must be part of the big pretend-scene—the
part where they all lay in a mess, knocked out by one bottle or another, done
in by someone’s wildly swinging fist. Skulls and bones, an unsettling but impressive
touch. Among them, shattered glasses and spilled pools of waste decorate the scene.

This is an
impressively disturbing tableau of undeath. I’m genuinely taken aback by its …
horror.

“Is everyone
okay?” I ask carelessly, looking around. “A little bit overdone, don’t you
think?—this scene? I didn’t know the dead could die. Seems silly, the thought.”
I blink. “So … Anyone getting up anytime soon?”

“No,” the
young man murmurs, quickly locking the front door of the tavern—no idea
why—then whipping over to the bar counter and inspecting it, looking for
something.

“Is this
normal? Bar fights? Is this what I have to look forward to for all eternity?”

“No,” he
mumbles again, agitated, opening cabinets, rummaging through drawers.

“I’m Winter.
That’s the name they gave me.” I watch him scavenge through every drawer behind
the counter, curious. “What’s the name they gave you?”

“No,” he says,
slams something shut, tears open another cabinet, a vein jutting out of his
forehead with his face scrunched up in frustration. “Not a drop of anything,
anywhere. Not even—Not even—”

“What are you
looking for? Wait,” I say, listening carefully. “Do you hear that?”

He stops his
hunting and stares at me now. I meet his eyes, pointing up at the ceiling where
I think the sound is coming from. “Do you hear that? It’s like ... a gentle
drum.”

“No,” he
whispers, the sound barely making it from his lips this time. “I hear nothing.”

“Do you think
whoever it was that started this is coming back? It sounds like footsteps, or
some kind of drum, or ... Wow, I can’t believe you can’t hear that. Just listen
...”

I draw closer
to him, thinking the noise is coming from the counter. Then I cross around the
counter and notice him stepping away from me.

“Wait,” I tell
him. “Just listen … Listen.”

His back is
pressed against the wall. Before I realize how closely I’ve come in pursuit of
the strange sound, I’m standing right in front of him.

Then I hear
it, clear as a spoken word. A thumping. A drumming.

The horror
returns to his eyes. Thumping. Thumping.

Drumming.
Within him.

A heartbeat.

C H A P T E R – T H R E E

Neither of us
move.

“Are you gonna
eat me
now?
” he asks, his voice breaking.

Distracted, I
say, “Answer’s still a resounding hell no.” But I can’t help staring at his
chest in a total stupor. How hadn’t I noticed sooner? “Is that—Is that a
heartbeat? Are you alive?”

“Stay away
from me.”

“You
are
alive!”

He edges his
way around me, hops back over the bar counter. I let him. What else am I going
to do ... keep him cornered like some captured kitten?

“Hey,” I call
out after him. “Answer me! Are you—”

“Keep your
voice down!” he breathes, hardly able to keep his own. “What are you trying to
do, get me killed?”

He’s searching
the tables now—for what, I could only imagine—when at once there’s a banging at
the front door of the tavern. Someone outside shouts to be let in.

The Living
man, in an instant he’s dived back behind the counter, his eyes peering up at
me beseechingly. “Make them go away!” he breathes. “Don’t tell them I’m here!
Get them gone!”

“Oh,” I say,
annoyed. “
Now
you want my help.”

He yanks open
all the lower cabinets, unsuccessful in finding one that’ll house his big
muscular body. He turns to me once more. “Look, I’m begging you.” But he hardly
sounds like he’s begging for all the disgust in his tone.

“Tell me how you’re
alive,” I say. “Tell me and I’ll help you.”

“I haven’t
died yet. Is that answer enough?”

“No.”

Now the person
outside is urgently pounding the door. They very, very much want to come in.

“Please,” the
man whispers, squishing himself as best as he can under the sink, his head
knocking into a pipe, his thick arm wedging itself deeper inside. “Please, please,
please. Don’t let them eat me. Please.”

“Ugh, quit
begging,” I tell him, annoyed. “Just stay down there, drummer. We have
unfinished business.”

Circumventing
the counter and daintily stepping over the skeleton bones and death—like I do
this every day—I head for the tavern door, twist the lock and swing it open.

A fat and
panicked face meets mine.

“You’re
alive!” the fat man shouts.

“Well not
exactly,” I say, confused. “Is there something I can help—?”

He pushes past
me, anxiously stepping into the tavern—I can’t stop him. His eyes take in the
scene of scattered bodies and bones with horror. He covers his mouth as if to
keep flies out.

“Who are you?”
I ask.

Then, as
quickly as the look of horror had come, it’s gone. “How rude of me not to
introduce mine-self! I am Mayor of Trenton. At times I’m not a very good one,
admittedly so.” His voices shakes, the only hint that his merry demeanor is put
on. “You don’t have to worry a bit. You’re still alive!”

“Again, I’m
not. What happened here? Is this normal for an Undead bar fight?”

He watches my
face for a long, intrigued moment before finally letting a chuckle wiggle its
way out of his belly. “Bar fight, you say? Hah! Yes, of course … A bar fight.
It was that and nothing more.”

Then his eyes
are met by the sight of one particular set of bones—one with the flesh still
somewhat there—and his cheer vanishes at once. “Oh, my spirits.” Pained
suddenly, he lowers to one knee. “I knew you,” he whispers to the set of bones.
“You who played your lute, midnights at the fountain. I’ve known you mine-self
since my own Raising long, long ago. You, lady of the song.”

Mine-self.
Curious word. I look down at what remains of the body, surprised he can
recognize anything at all. “Can’t she just be ... fixed up? At the Refinery?”

“No,” the
Mayor whispers in a daze, as though he weren’t addressing me at all. “No, she
cannot.”

“What do you
mean? I thought ... I thought we couldn’t—”

“No, of course
not!” he agrees, snapping out of it. “We cannot die! We’re perfectly fine, the
lot of us. We’re all just fine!” he keeps saying.

I stare at
him, unable to make words.

And then the
tavern doors burst open, revealing three very strange-looking people. One
militant woman in a black beret flanked by two bony men garbed in grey.

“Survivor?”
the woman barks, her eyes locked on me.

“And
you
are?” I ask.

“You must go
with her,” the Mayor tells me, throwing his eyes from the sight of his mangled
friend. “She will take care of you. Your body might be compromised.”

The woman
snaps her finger. “Now, girl.”

“There’s
nothing wrong!” the Mayor says, forcing the happiness onto his face again.
“All’s fine!—They’re gone!”

I blink. “Who’s
gone?”

And then the
woman’s got me by the arm before I even realize she’d advanced on me. No use
trying to pull away, this woman’s grip is humorless.

As she guides
me toward the tavern door, however, my eyes flick over to the counter, having
nearly forgotten the man hiding there. You know, the one with a pulse.

“Wait,” I say.
“I forgot my—my purse in the—”

The militant
woman isn’t having it. “This way, girl.” And with her talons on my arm, I’m
ushered from the tavern. My last thought being, hope the man with the warm
hands can fend for himself.

Whatever’s to
come of him.

But first
thing’s first: What’s to come of me? I’m led through winding streets and
cobblestone roads into a part of Trenton I’ve not yet been. We stop at a stubby
door in an alleyway which, at the sound of the woman’s sharp shout, is opened
at once.

Through a mess
of turning hallways and corridors, passing unlabeled doors and plain off-white
walls, I’m finally directed into a room that bears nothing save a rickety chair
into which I’m unceremoniously planted.

“Your name,”
the woman demands.

“Winter?” I
say, like a question.

“Your real
name.”

The two bony
men at either side of the woman, they stand there with arms folded, two
bodyguards. As if this tough lady needs any bodyguards.

“I … haven’t
had my whatever-dream yet,” I admit, squinting, “so I don’t know my ‘real
name’, ma’am.” Ma’am seems the most appropriate thing to call her. I’m reminded
of a livid schoolteacher here to discipline me—for what grievous offense I’ve
yet to guess. “Can I ask what’s going on?”

“Who is your
Reaper?”

I have to
think a moment before remembering what the hell a Reaper is. “H-Helena Trim.
I’m her—Raise.”

“How long
ago?”

“No clue.”
Partial lie. With Grimsky’s help, I’ve been counting the two months and two
days I’ve been Undead.

“Are you a
Human?”

“Weren’t we
all, once?”

“Do you work
for Humans?”

I smirk.
“Isn’t having a job discouraged?”

“No time for
smarts,” she says shortly, narrowing her eyes. “Answer the question.”

“No, I don’t
work for anyone.”

“Have you
encountered any Humans?”

And now I
hesitate. I think on warm skin. Watery eyes. I think on my stupidity for not
knowing the moment I saw him what he was. But now he’s gone, probably forever.
Like my Old Life. Like life at all. Does this world even have green
trees?—grass?—birds?

I know it has
cockroaches.

“Any Humans,
girl,” she snaps. “Answer.”

Lying’s easy
when you’re dead. “No.”

“Are you a
Deathless?”

I blink. “A
say-what-less?”

The woman nods
abruptly at one of her bony men. “Dreck, perform the final test.”

My eyes flit
from one face to another, alarmed. “Final test? What final—”

And before I
even get the word out, there’s a sword through my chest. A ringing silence
fills the room. I do not move. I
cannot
move. No one so much as curls a
finger as I sit here, stabbed like a note to the wall. We all idly stare at me
like we’re watching the evening news.

A curious
headline that’d make. This just in: Dead girl impaled with sword.

“I don’t feel
anything,” I whisper finally.

Then quick as
it went in, one of the bony men grabs its hilt, slides the sword out of me like
I’m a sheath. He hands the gleaming thing back to the woman.

I’m still
staring at my chest. “And that was for—?”

“Just a test,”
the woman says simply, and her voice is less aggressive now, almost kind.

“A test? Spearing
me with a sword was just a test?”

“A steel
sword,” she corrects me, using a bit of cloth to wipe the blade down. “The
Deathless,” she goes on while wiping, “are sensitive,” wipe, wipe, “to steel.”

“Can someone
explain to me what’s going on? I’ve not been around for long. Things are still
new to me. Hilda’s
not
going to be happy you stabbed this new red dress.”

“Send her my
regards,” the woman says, hands off the blade to one of her men, then leaves
the room with him.

“Hello??” I
call out after her. “I have
questions
…!”

“Come,” the
remaining man says, indicating a door.

“Where are you
taking me now?”

“To the
Refinery for a little Upkeep,” he says, then adds, “unless you prefer keeping
that hole in your heart.”

My hand moves
there. I suddenly feel very self-conscious, almost hurt, almost wishing I hurt.

“Are you
ready?” he asks with patiently hanging eyes.

“Okay,” says
me, says Winter, says whoever.

It’s about an
hour later that I’m leaving the squatty pink building I was somewhat created
in, thanking a strange mouthless woman (who isn’t Marigold or Roxie or the
twelve-year-old girl I’d met before) for filling my chest-chasm. It’s amazing,
the things you’re so quick to accept about this peculiar world. When the door
shuts, I feel utterly alone and dismal. There’s even a howling wind snaking
between the buildings that, had I any real hairs on the back of my neck, would
raise them chillingly.

I’m need to
accept that there will be many things I’ll never understand here. I could pull
my arm off a hundred times, it won’t make me like my new life any better.

I want my old
one back. Whatever it was.

Thinking of
the tavern makes the walk back to my house a very forlorn one. I can’t stop picturing
the man I left behind. Maybe he’s dead already, that little flame of Life I was
so fortunate to run into, already extinguished. I find no offense in living
people, I don’t see what the big deal is. I find it thrilling, the idea of
having real eyesight again, being able to smell the flowers. That is, if
there’s any left. Maybe my favorite are sunflowers. When I have my Waking
Dream, I wonder if that will change too. Maybe I like daisies instead. Tulips.

There is a
woman I learned about on one of my first days. She’s infamously called Mad
Malory and her story is a tragic one. After emerging from the Refinery on her
first day, she was regarded as one of the most beautiful creations ever made.
They called her Magnificent Malory back then. Marvelous Malory. Magical Malory.
Everyone in town wanted to know everything about her. Every woman (and some
men) wanted to be her.

Until she had
her Waking Dream.

The very
moment it happened, she emitted a scream that would never end. The soles of her
feet might as well have been set afire for all anyone knew. This woman took to
the streets shrieking in throat-splitting agony and no one knew why at first.
No one could approach her. Everyone, the whole of Trenton, was frightened. But
they hadn’t been frightened enough, for the next thing she did was unbearable
for anyone to witness: She clawed off her own face. With those fabulous pearly
new nails she’d been given courtesy of the Refinery’s ample talent, she dug
deep until the skin pulled clean from her skull. Screaming not from physical
pain, but from emotional anguish, from whatever memories of her Old Life her
Waking Dream had gifted her, she screamed and screamed until her voice broke.
Literally … broke.

I’d really
wished the person who told me this story hadn’t gone into such detail, but she
did. And it goes on.

Mad Malory she
was, she took to her home and set it on fire. With herself inside. But we are
not the stuff that living people are made of, and no amount of fire could kill
her or put an end to her inner torture. Indeed, we cannot be destroyed, I’m
told. Her body ablaze, burning without end, feeling none of it, feeling all of
it, she tore through the city, broke through the gates of Trenton and vanished
into the Dying Wood—an infinite plain of lifeless trees that surrounds our
humble dwelling. Into the burning horizon she ran, never to be heard of again.