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Sunset Ce ins co It was still a place for the rich and famous to be interred, like our local famous brewery family, the Busches

In his day, Edwin Alonzo Herman had been a very iht so, too It looiant There was enough light to see that the huge angel had a sword and shield, and it gave you sense that it aiting to pass judgment, and you wouldn&039;t like what it decided Of course, ht

There wereat the paved road, h faht when I introducedI&039;d started telling people up front that I&039;d be using achickens, for two different reasons I&039;d had an overzealous bodyguard of a very wealthyblade At a different graveside for a historical society, the secretary of said society had jumped me and tried to save the chicken She&039;d turned out to be a vegan That&039;s like a rabid fundalad later that it hadn&039;t been cold enough to wear a coat, because leather is the only kind of coat I own

Tonight was cold enough for coats October isn&039;t usually that chilly in St Louis, but tonight had decided to be cold OrI&039;d been surprised by two things about the ski so wasn&039;t uncoht was damn cold I&039;d never fully appreciated how much warainst rass in my little boots and skirt I huddled in the borrowed leather jacket, but kept my face away from the collar I did not want a repeat of what had happened in the car I willed the warmth inI&039;d taken one of the taller ood, but it would have covered h, since it had been nearly two hundred years in a cemetery that was as well-maintained as Sunset, there was no way for rave had been, not really A lot of the graves had been moved here from smaller cemeteries over the years, as increased population had needed the land But I had dropped just enough of rave lay His bones were under there, I could feel them

To the watchers from the road who had paid for this show, ita little far away froel But it had been rave, the croays thinks they&039;ve had a good show They&039;ll forgive almost any lack of showmanship on my part, once they&039;ve seen me raise the dead Funny, that

The crate with softly clucking chickens was near my feet Grahauments Once we left the Jeep, he went back into serious security guard , business only person he&039;d been when I first saw hi a plain white T-shirt with his black jeans, jogging shoes, and his own short, leather jacket He&039;d changed out of the Guilty Pleasures shirt without being asked The joking, half-flirting o had vanished behind a very serious face and a pair of dark eyes that kept searching the cemetery, the people near us, and farther away, so he was very obviously aware of the periuard I&039;d let the lawyers think he was and showed theers, to prove the necessity No one had argued that this was private business and they didn&039;t like anyone but aze on their faces He had a really good stare, a hardness to his face and eyes that did not

Requie with all the rest of the zo equip, but it would have taken et the chickens They tended to squawk if you didn&039;t carry the theht, I tried not to scare them I had to kill them to raise the dead, but I could oes under the heading of pain in the wrong situation Being a blood sacrifice probably qualifies as a wrong situation, even if you&039;re a chicken

I&039;d persuaded Requie, black cloak in the Jeep, because in it, he looked like a cute version of the Gri clubbing Maybe it was the leather pants? Or the boots? Or the long-sleeved silk shirt in a deep green jewel tone that made his white skin almost shine in contrast The shirt had reen in that bright blue somewhere He&039;d been harder to explain than Graham, because even without the cloak, he didn&039;t really look like a bodyguard He looked like what he was, and that was nothing that any of Herht The only walking dead they wanted to see tonight was Herman himself I&039;d told them the vampire stayed, they could like it, or luated to return their down pay Edwin Herrave I was here, ready to fulfillmore than a hundred years worth of zombie raised, it&039;s sort of a seller&039;s market, and I was the seller There were two other animators in the United States that could do it One in California, and one in New Orleans, but they weren&039;t here, and I was Besides, they were nearly as expensive as I was, and they also came with the cost of plane fare and hotels More h there was an elderly woman on the side of the family that had inherited the money that wanted to leave if the "deht Requiem was a demon, she&039;d never seen one for real I had, and I knew the difference

But the lawyers had settled therand in the dark for me to do my job

I had the chickens in their crate, andwith theelse, I had to drop h to do this I&039;d learned how to shield, really shield, so that I could fight off the urge to use h so I didn&039;t raise the dead by accident There&039;d been a professor in college that coht He wanted to tell his wife he was sorry That was back when I wasn&039;t raising anything, just shut it down, ignored it I&039;nore it Psychic ability will coh, it&039;ll find a way And you probably won&039;t like what it will find

I dropped h so I could open that part of me that raised the dead It was like a fist that stayed clenched and tight, and only when I relaxed, spread wide those ers, could I be free I knew people that had studied with animators or voodoo practitioners to acquire the skills needed to raise the dead I&039;d studied to learn how not to raise the dead But it took a little effort, all the time, to keep that fist closed, that power shut down It was like a piece of me never completely relaxed, not even when I slept, unless I was here, with the true dead Here to call one of therave It was the only moment that all of me could be free

I stood there for a , like a wind, except that this wind didn&039;tyour skin It was like I&039;d been holding ht, and finally I could let it out, let it all out, and relax Once I&039;d stopped being afraid of it, it felt so good to be with the dead Peaceful, so peaceful, because whatever was left in the grave had nothing to do with souls or pain Quiet as the grave wasn&039;t just a saying But I&039;d forgotten that there were dead near at hand that weren&039;t underground

My power touched Requienored him, but it didn&039;t That cool not-wind curled around hi-lost lover I&039;d never felt anything quite like it For the first time I truly understood that my poas over the dead, all the dead, and that undead is still dead I&039;d always thought, and been told, that vampires killed necromancers for fear that they would be controlled by them, but in that second, I knew that wasn&039;t the whole truth It was as if a door opened inside me, to a room that I hadn&039;t known existed Inside thatIt had no shape thatto hold, but it was there, and it was real, and it was me, mine, sort of A "power plateau" Byron and Requiem had called it, but that wasn&039;t it Plateau is static, not growing, not changing This wasn&039;t static

It blew out toward me, and if it had been a real room in a real house, the house would have exploded outith the force of its colass andin that round zero of some mysterious blast

It was inside me, so it couldn&039;t slam into me, that was silly, but that&039;s still what it did It slahtless, nothingness There was nothing but the rawness of that power

I came to, with Graham&039;s voice "Anita, Anita, can you hearrave, could feel Edwin Alonzo Her underneath &039;s wrong, Requieh I openedover me

"She&039;s awake," Graha position, but I lifted my hand up toward Requiem

The vampire reached down for ht, but he wasn&039;t there for me in that moment My business ith the dead, and Graham was too war its hand out to ers brushed mine, and the power inside , and noas still I touched his hand in that sudden stillness, and there was no pulse in his palm No beat of blood to distract the senses He blinked at me, his lips moved, but he did not breathe He was still He was dead He was mine

He pulled rave, hand in hand I looked up into that face, met the turquoise flame of his eyes, but it wasn&039;t aze It was he that fell into limpse from his mind to littering in them It was the way my eyes had looked when Obsidian Butterfly, a vaoddess, had shown ued with her about whether or not she was deity Soht I&039;d used the power I&039;d learned from her only twice, and both tiht was suddenly less dark I could see details, colors, things that my own eyes could never have seen Requiereen it seemed to burn like his eyes It was a kind of hyperfocus, and it wasn&039;t just sight His hand in mine felt heavier than it should have, more important than it should have, as if I could feel each whorl of his fingertip like tiny silken lines against my hand To make love like this would either be the most wondrous experience of your life, or drive you mad

I remembered this power, but it wasn&039;t what I needed I had another flash from Requiem&039;s mind, a tiny flash of fear, quieted al him and I didn&039;t want him to be afraid The stars in my eyes drowned in a rush of flame, black flame with a center of brown, as if ere the flame, and fire what it ate

My eyes were, for a moment, what they&039;d be if I&039;d been a vaht, so dark it was alrave, and Graham saw them

"Oh, God," he whispered

"Get off the grave, Graham," I said, and round and stared up at me

"Move, Graham," I said, "you won&039;t want to be there when I&039;m finished"

He scrah" He stayed close, eyes wide, fear like a scent off of his skin, but he didn&039;t run, and he didn&039;t try to distance hiround and drew Requiem doith me, so that he knelt behind e solid wall of quiet strength behind me I&039;d known that I amplified Jean-Claude&039;s pohen I was near hi now It wasn&039;t a triumvirate of power between Requiem and me, it was that he was one of Jean-Claude&039;s vampires, and that made him mine in a way Mine to call on, mine to use, mine to reward

I bent until round, until I could feel the dead just below round ater, and I knew there was so just below me, and all I had to do was reach down and save them

I whispered, "Edwin Alonzo Herman, hear me" I felt him stir, like a sleeper disturbed by a drearave" I felt his bones grow long and straight, felt his flesh coalesce around hi a broken doll He rean to spread outward, began to seek another grave, but some small part of me that was still rave I knew in that instant that I could raise this cemetery That I could raise the, but the power blowing through me, and the vampire at my back Because the poanted to be used It wanted to help raves, pull theht of stars, and fill theood to lift theht that helpful power Fought not to spread like a sweet sickness through the graves Fought to hold on to as left of who I&039;d thought I was I needed help I thought about Jean-Claude, but that wasn&039;t it I needed to remember that I wasn&039;t just the dead I was alive

I reached out to the other third of our triumvirate I reached out to Richard He looked up atroom table I saw his father like an older clone of Richard hi a blue bowl Charlotte, hisdoor just behind that chair She was still about ure that was both petite and full-figured Except for the hair color and skin tone, Charlotte even reminded me of me There was a reason that h wo with her fa, or any noise fro family scene They all see this here

I started to pull away, and Richard&039;s voice was in my head "Wait, wait, Anita, please" He excused hi room, out onto the sweep of porch, and down the handful of steps until he could gaze up into the saazed up into the air, gazed at , because he said, "Dear God, Anita, what&039;s happened? I&039;ve felt your power before, but not like this"

I didn&039;t have enough control to talk in et the out loud version, but I was past caring "The va that we&039;ve hit a neer level"

He hugged his bare arms in the T-shirt He hadn&039;t stopped for a jacket "It&039;s like the night is breathing your power What can I do?"

"Remind me that I&039;s that have a heartbeat"

"Hoill that help?"

I wanted to scream my frustration at him "God, Richard, just help me, please help If you don&039;t, I&039;ht"

He nodded "I&039;m sorry, I&039;esture, he was thinking, or gathering his will for so he didn&039;t want to do But I didn&039;t have tiht I was too scared of the power that pulsed in the ground underneath raves I knew that tonight I could raise one of those sha, and usually has nothing to do with real necromancy

He looked back at the house and said, "I&039;m fine, Mom I just need a little privacy Keep everybody close to the house, okay" He shook his head "No, Mom, it&039;s not that close to the full moon"

He walked out into the openness of the yard away frohts of the house and he let down his shields--the ed and helped hiht was suddenly alive in a way that it hadn&039;t been The still air held a thousand scents: the ripeness of apples froreen blanket against our face; trees, the spicy tang of sweet guent wood of poplar, and over it all, the dry richness of fallen leaves all around us Sounds, then The last crickets of the year chirping their plaintive song Other insects fros before the cold caroaned around the house The big oak by the driveway threw its branches against the stars, and Richard raised his head to watch that ind There was barely a breeze on the ground, but up high in the highest trees, the wind ran fast and pulled at the bare limbs at the very top of the trees Most people don&039;t look up, animals look up, because they know that there is no true safety They don&039;t worry about it the e do, but they&039;re aware of it in a way that we aren&039;t

Richard walked into the edge of trees that began the woods that bordered the western edge of the family land He touched a trunk, laid his hands on it, and it was rough and hard, with deep grooves in the bark like tiny tunnels He laid his face against that roughness, and it was spicy and pungent, and I kneeet guh balls still hung on to the edges of the tree He hugged the tree, hugged it so tight that the bark dug into his skin, he rubbed his cheek against the roughness of it, like he was scentat an easy lope through the trees, into the woods He wasn&039;t hunting He was running for the joy of it

He twisted through the underbrush like it wasn&039;t there And as I&039;d felt only once before, it was as if the trees and bushes welcorowth could be water, and he dived through it, running, dodging, twisting, giving his and branches and the feel of the living ground underfoot There was life that didn&039;t run or hide, it was all alive, alive in a way that most humans never understand

Richard ran, and he took o Then he&039;d held led to keep up, to understand Noas effortless, because I was inside his head, inside hiht was alive for him in a way that it wasn&039;t for Jean-Claude, or for me I was too human, and Jean-Claude&039;s interest in life was too shallow Neither of us could feel what Richard&039;s beast could give hi touched rave Requierave He looked uncertain, but he was sniffing the air near my skin "You smell like trees and pack," he said softly

Richard looked up at us "Why is Grahauard Jean-Claude was afraid of ould happen if I didn&039;t have souard you, and he can&039;t do that on the grave"

"You&039;re supposed to guard me, Graham, you can&039;t do that from here" The sharp scent of wolf thickened around me as I said it

Grahaed to the ground, doing the wolf grovel "I&039;ot et back to work" Richard said it first, and I echoed it for him

Grahauard ht come

Richard took in a deep breath, and I smelled that thick, sweet scent of deep woods He&039;d run miles, effortlessly, not for the same reason that a human will run well, but because the land itself helped hith, welcomed him

He stood there in the round I realized that Richard wasin his chest from that joyous run I kept s faraway frorave, and even with Requieof Richard&039;s heart miles away

"Edwin Alonzo Herrave Co, all different froht just the same

I felt the corpse shift, solidify, piece itself together like a puzzle, and begin to rise up through the earth as if it ater I&039;d watched this happen countless tiround when it happened The earth buckled and rolled like an earthquake that was trapped in a few feet of ground The ground flowed underelse, not water, notboth less and ht was happening, but he didn&039;t try to pull away, he stayed solid at my back He rode it with me and never made a noise Brave va earth, cool fingers wrapped around my warmth Edwin Alonzo Herman&039;s hands wrapped around iven up hope and finally touches a rope The grave threw hi free of the earth, but the push of it forcedon the writhing, twisting ground, I would have fallen But Requierave, pulled hirave dirt falling away from a perfect black suit that looked as if it had been freshly pressed His hair was balding with a thick fringe just above the ears and down the collar, and thick sideburns that curved to a walrus thick mustache He was portly, nearly fat, which had been in style a the rich When Edwin Alonzo died, only the poor were skinny, only the poor looked starved

I felt Richard still standing by the edge of that small stream The air was cooler by thatto slow fro to cool on his skin He wasn&039;t afraid, or horrified He si me with the pulse and beat of his body, the thick musk of wolf faint in the autumn air

I stared up at the zoood work With a big enough blood sacrifice I could raise a zombie that looked alive, close at least, but this, this was perfect His skin looked full and healthy in the starlight He had a faint smile on his face, and his clothes looked as if he&039;d just put the with polish Polish so shiny I noticed by ht The hands that were pressed to mine were cool, but they didn&039;t feel dead He wasn&039;t breathing, but he looked, felt,I&039;d known there was a lot of power tonight, and I&039;d had to force all of it into this one grave, so I guess it was alright that he looked this good, but for aface, I was afraid Afraid that I&039;d done more than I&039;d been paid for, but when I reached his eyes, I let out a sigh of relief The eyes were thick and full and looked, again, perfect, grayish in the starlight, probably would be blue in the brighter light, but there was no one ho I knehat they aiting for, those empty eyes

I lifted my left hand away froers just opened as I moved I held my hand at shoulder level, toward the vae"

Requiem kept one hand on my shoulder, but used the other hand to peel back the tape on my wrist

"Take it off," I said

He finally ripped the bandage away I couldn&039;t stop a small jerk of pain

Richard called insideto do?"

"He needs blood, so he can speak I didn&039;t kill an aniot"

He didn&039;t say anything, but I felt his pulse begin to pick up speed

I offered htly taller body in front ofI&039;d seen before in the better preserved zo that paused in their eyes, as if there were darker things waiting, waiting for a chance for a body to inhabit Soood But that whiskered face turned toward my wrist, sniffed the air, and the moment it scented the blood, that otherness in its eyes vanished Driven out by the pro