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I stopped and asked if he was okay

He shrugged "Business is a little slow tonight, I guess" Hope stole across his face "You want a hot dog?"

I didn’t, really But I bought one

The hot dog seller got busy, slathering on hts I eat a dog or two for every one I sell But tonight"

A group of zombies passed on the sidewalk The ss wafted frole head turned It wasn’t just eerie; it was downright weird

I overpaid for the hot dog and told the guy to keep the change, which got ri A little salty, but not bad Maybe I should’ve ht two

ONCE AGAIN, I DIDN’T TURN DOWN KANE’S STREET ONCE again, I thought about how ined the feel of his arain, I turned away

Excuses? I had a fistful of ’es to do before his rally With the restriction dropping to Code Yellow, he’d be up extra early tohe needed was a ht drop-in fro for the elevator, when I finally ad Kane We needed to talk And I had absolutely no idea what to say

9

MY APARTMENT WAS EMPTY--AND QUIET NO TV BLARED As I’d thought, Juliet was out hunting Dad was probably roosting somewhere out in Needha at the screen and scarfing popcorn, because then I could hang out with thes were happening The Morfran was possessing zo theht the prophesied white falcon out of the Darklands and into the human world Even the fact that Deadtown’s zombies had lost their appetites en masse seeer I had to consult the book

Please, I thought, not knoho or what I was beseeching, not another vision

The Book of Utter Darkness waited on the kitchen table, where it had been since Dad’s last attempt to read it You’d think it would look innocent, ordinary An everyday sight Just a book lying flat on a tabletop

Not this book It pulsed with menace--literally--like so the air When I hovered my hand a couple of inches froertips The snapping resolved into a rhyth heart: duh DUM duh DUM duh DUM duh DUM

The pulse traveled uppast h my shoulder, down intoto hijack its rhythm

Duh DUM duh DUM

I shivered and pulledill, I let both hands drop into ht The right was cold, stinging with the book’s energy, but the left covered it like a blanket Warot up and went to the sink, where I grabbed a pair of rubber gloves Juliet had bought them, not that she’d ever washed a dish in her life--or her undeath, for that loves would keep your hands soft and, later, was disgusted to learn they only perfor housework She’d tossed theotten about theood for so else They insulated me from The Book of Utter Darkness

I pulled them on They were hot pink--not what you’d call my color--and clu like the daes