Graveminder

Daisha vanished.

Cissy jerked to her feet and half pulled, half dragged Rebekkah toward the house. “I didn’t intend to feed them yet, but plans change. Soon as you’re dead, Liz will be the next Graveminder. She’s the only one left. Teresa will become clearheaded and strong.”

Cissy opened the door and shoved Rebekkah into the house.

“Why?” Rebekkah repeated. “You killed your daughter.”

“Teresa understood. She’ll be my warrior in this world, and Liz will be able to take me to the other.” Cissy’s smile was that of a zealot, of a woman whose beliefs were everything to her, and that sort of true believer was a terrifying thing. “The others weren’t thinking. All these years, they worked for him— servants to Mr D ... I read all about it when I was younger. I spent hours reading all those journals. We serve him, yet what do we get?”

Between the pain in her leg and her own doubts, Rebekkah had no answer to this question, but Cissy wasn’t looking for one.

She continued. “All that power. Two worlds , Becky. Yet here we are trapped in a few miles of land. He has an entire world. Woman after woman is his servant. Barrow women. We’ve died because of his choices. No more. I’m not some dead man’s servant.”

“You aren’t the Graveminder.” Rebekkah forced the words out around the pain. She leaned against the wall and tried to stare at her aunt, but her eyes had lost their focus. The desire to close them warred with the fear that if she did so, she’d never be able to open them back up.

Behind them, Daisha reappeared and said, “Hello, Miz Barrow.”

Cissy turned. “What are you doing here?”

Daisha sniffed. “I found the Graveminder. That’s what I was supposed to do. I remember that ... and now I have her.”

“I don’t want you in my house.” Cissy didn’t back away, but her posture was tense as she tried to surreptitiously look around the kitchen. “How did you get in?”

“There’s no barrier around your house now. You pulled her over it.” Daisha’s voice was very matter-of- fact.

Rebekkah blinked. She wasn’t sure whether her gun-waving aunt or the dead girl who’d murdered Maylene was the bigger threat. Given the choice, though, she’d put her faith in the dead. She took a step toward Daisha and stumbled. Her eyes drifted shut. “You ...” she started.

In less time than it took Rebekkah to force herself to open her eyes, Daisha stepped forward and lifted Rebekkah in her arms. She held her aloft like she was a small child. “Is she for me?”

“I was going to give her to the others, but”—Cissy backed away—“you can have her. You seem alert. That’s the consequence of eating. I’d rather they aren’t alert yet.”

The door to the garage opened then, and Byron stepped over the salt separating the house from the garage. He left the door open. The dead were no longer contained by salt circles. They stood waiting on the other side of the line of salt at the threshold. Byron was bloodied, but still standing.

Cissy’s eyes widened. “What have you done?”

Byron didn’t spare her a glance. He stepped up to Daisha. “Are you sure?”

“Take her out of here.” Daisha handed Rebekkah to him. As soon as she released Rebekkah, she grabbed Cissy. The movements were so quick as to seem virtually simultaneous.

Byron walked into the living room and set Rebekkah on the sofa. He lifted a clear plastic container that looked like it should be filled with rice or cereal. Then he poured its contents on the threshold between the kitchen and the living room.

“Daisha!” Rebekkah struggled to her feet.

Byron walked over and stopped her. “No. She’s staying a bit longer.”

“You can’t. She helped me.” Rebekkah squirmed to get up.

“This is her choice. In a moment, I’ll let her out. Trust me.”

When she nodded, he stepped over the salt line and back into the kitchen. “We can do this another way,” he said.

“This is the price of my help, Undertaker,” Daisha said.

As Rebekkah watched, Daisha nodded toward the salt that kept the rest of the dead from entering the kitchen and directed, “Remove it.”

“Montgomery! You can’t listen to her.” Cissy sounded terrified, but her present fear could do nothing to undo the horrible things she’d done.

“Byron?” Rebekkah called. He glanced at her, and she said softly, “Please do as Daisha asks.”

For a moment, he hesitated. Then, without looking away from her, he scraped his foot over the line, removing the salt barrier, and letting four more Hungry Dead into the kitchen.

As he did so, Daisha shoved Cissy at the dead and put herself between them and Byron. “Go.”

He didn’t waste any time; he ran into the living room. He bent down to pick Rebekkah up off the couch, but she put out a hand to stop him and then glanced back into the kitchen.

“Not yet. I need to”—she made herself look at him—“bear witness.”

“You don’t.” He tore his gaze from her eyes to the wound in her leg. “You were shot . Let me get you to the truck and then—”

“Not yet,” she repeated. She looked past him to the kitchen, where the dead were consuming a pleading and screaming Cissy. “ This is where I need to be.”

If they were going to sentence someone to die, she’d not hide from that death. The sight of it, the shrieks as Cissy was pulled from one dead hand to another, wouldn’t be anything she’d soon forget, but she watched nonetheless.

This was justice: the dead deserved recompense.

Chapter 54

IT ONLY TOOK A FEW MINUTES. AFTERWARD, DAISHA CALLED OUT, “UNdertaker?”

On the sofa, Rebekkah closed her eyes. Her wound needed tending, but Daisha didn’t know how to help the Graveminder. All she knew was that she would do whatever she could so the Graveminder could get medical attention, get well, and survive.

“Let me out of here so we can get her to the doctor.” Daisha pointed at the salt line.

Silently, Byron grabbed the container of salt that he’d carried into the living room. He held it poised. “On the count of three. One, two”—he brushed away a salt line—“three.”

She ran forward, and he immediately replaced the line before the others could cross.

Byron stared into Daisha’s eyes and said, “Rebekkah might forget that you’re a monster, but I don’t. You’re still dead even if you aren’t like them,” he muttered, motioning toward the kitchen. “You’re a killer.”

“I am, but she needs to forgive us. It’s who she is.” Daisha lowered her voice. “And you ... I don’t think you are supposed to forgive.”

“I don’t really give a fuck about what we’re supposed to do,” he ground out.

She grinned. “Yeah? Me either ... because I suspect I’m not supposed to want to help either of you, but I do.”

His mouth opened, but he didn’t say anything.

“Help her up, Undertaker. We have a few dead folk that need taken to that abyss under your home.” Daisha frowned and then walked away. After a quick examination of the mostly barren bathroom, she grabbed a large towel, which she ripped into strips as she walked back to the sofa. She held the improvised bandage out to Byron. “Here.”

He said nothing as he accepted it and gently bound Rebekkah’s leg. Rebekkah, however, caught Daisha’s hand. “Thank you,” she said.

To that, Daisha had no words, so she nodded and watched the Undertaker. After a moment, she realized that she was still holding on to the Graveminder’s hand and immediately dropped it.