the strength to stop her.
'I eased my way up onto the widow's walk, and he still had his back to me. When I got my feet steady, I stood up, and Lordy, how the wind was blowing. Like it was the breath of the whole sky let out all at once. I ran toward Ephram, my clothes whipping all out behind me in the breeze. He turned just when I reached him.'
Anna's mouth was open, her cup between her loose fingers. The fire spat, sending a coal toward Anna. Sylva reached out with her shoe and rubbed the ember into the floor.
That was a sign of being marked for death, sure as any. When the ember shoots at you, you 're done for.
'What happened then?' Anna asked, her eyes wide. As if they were sitting on a front porch somewhere swapping made-up ghost stories. As if this weren't real.
'I pushed him over, off the rail. And he let me. Didn't raise a hand to stop me. Just smiled as he went over. You never heard such a scream. The kind of scream a rabbit makes when a horned owl digs its claws into the back of its neck. Except way longer and louder.
'But there was a laugh mixed in, too. That's when I knew getting rid of Ephram Korban wasn't going to be so easy.'
Anna nodded. Sylva could see she was thinking about it, sorting it out, trying to make the pieces fit. It felt good to be telling after all these years. Maybe she could die with an unburdened heart when and if her time ever came.
'What about your baby?' Anna asked.
Sylva stared into the fire. She was tired, crushed by the weight of more than a century of haunts. Keeping tabs on them all these years wasn't easy, especially when they had her outnumbered. She hoped her conjure bags and her faith and her spells would be enough. There were a lot of poppets in that little cabin, a passle of dead folks.
'Sun's coming up,' she said. 'Ought to be safe enough now. You and me need to go for a walk.'
Bloody birds.
William Roth hoped to catch a red-tailed hawk in flight, or at least something colorful like a blue jay or cardinal. Nature's way was to give color to the male of the species, while the female was designed to blend into the background. If only the human birds would behave that way, follow the order of things. Cris and that tight little wonder called Zainab were as elusive as any of these Appalachian avians. The only winged things about were ravens, black and ugly and watching from the trees as if waiting for a funeral.
Roth looked through his lens at the cusp of sunrise. The southern Appalachian mountains reminded him of Scotland's, rounded and rich. He would take a few rolls of scenic stuff, that was always fodder for travel magazines and the like. If he wasn't going to have any luck with the ladies, might as well carry the old lunch bucket.
He stepped out of the trees where the wooden bridge spanned the great valley of granite and scrub vegetation. Far below ran a silver stream, tumbling between boulders on its way to the ocean. Korban knew how to live, all right. Set up a mansion at the top of the world, have a house full of young serving girls, play artist, and enjoy the high life. Who'd blame the bloke for not wanting to let such pleasures go? If Roth were Korban, he'd certainly become a ghost and hang about.
Roth chuckled. Ghosts and that rot. He'd seen photos that people claimed depicted spirits. Roth could achieve the same trick by fuzzing a negative or playing with the light in the darkroom. Give him an hour and he could crank out a hundred different double- and triple-exposures, and he didn't need a digital file or computer to do it. He could put Elvis on the moon, he could have Ephram Korban drifting over the manor, he could stick Cris Whitfield's head on Marilyn Monroe's nude body.
Now, that was a project that might be worth pursuing. Or maybe Spence's chippie, whom he'd seen before dawn, walking the halls with a blank look in her eyes. Had a lovely blue bruise on her face, Spence must have played a bit rough in the sack. Maybe Roth could hide in their bathroom, get a firelit shot of the old bastard giving her what for. Blackmail him or sell it to the tabloids, either way a tidy bundle.
He walked out onto the bridge, switched to a longer lens, and advanced the film. The air stirred around him, that mountain wind that could cut right through a bloke's bones. But it wasn't just the wind. The ravens had swooped from the forest and lit on the rails of the bridge. Dozens of them. Staring at Roth with those beady black eyes.
Waiting.
'Bloody hell,' he said.
'Hell is only in the mind, Mr. Roth.'
He turned, and Lilith stood in the middle of the bridge. How in blazes? Where had she come from?
'I hope you're not thinking of leaving us.'
'Um. I was just getting this vista.' He held up the camera. 'The views around here are perfectly lovely.'
He gave her a closer look. That black dress clung to her in a rather dramatic fashion. She was a bit pale, reminded him of those girls from North England, the ones from factory towns where the smog and rain cut down on the sunbathing. Still, she was young and she had curves. If serving girls were good enough for Korban, why not Sir William Bloody Bollocks-Swinging Roth?
'Lots of lovely views around,' he said. He smiled. Younger girls liked his smile. Or pretended to, which amounted to the same.
'Yes. I used to paint them. Before I went to work for Ephram Korban.'
'Work for Korban? He died a long time ago, and you're just a pip.'
She gave her own smile, a fleeting, mysterious thing. Coy bird, that one.
'Say,' he said, gently stroking his lens. 'Mind if I get the most lovely view I've found since I got here?'
'Be our guest, Mr. Roth.'
He lifted the camera and aimed it at her, zoomed onto her breasts, focusing on one nipple. Bras weren't part of the uniform, apparently. Likely not panties, either. This girl was definitely quick to serve.
He took a couple of pictures of her face, framed up nice with that hair and eyes as dark as the ravens, skin fresh as rocks in the rain, lips quick and clever with a smile. When he'd devoted enough attention to thoroughly flatter her, he said, 'You ever get any time off? I wouldn't mind getting to know you a bit better. Take some pictures in a more secluded environment.'
'That can be arranged, Mr. Roth.'
'Call me William, love.'
She imitated his imitation accent. 'Okay, William Love.'
Had a sense of humor, too. She'd be a joy to tumble. Roth moved toward her, wanting to get close enough for her to marvel at the sparkle in his smoky eyes. Something crawled across his face and he brushed it away.
God save the bloody queen, it was a spider.
He stepped back and saw the web spun between him and Lilith, stretching across the bridge like golden wire, the dew catching the sunrise. He detested spiders. From the African veldt to the Arctic tundra, the little buggers jumped at you with their sharp pincers. He'd read somewhere that, no matter where you stood on the globe, there'd be a spider within six feet of you, and he believed it.
He looked down at the rough planks of the bridge. The yellow-striped bastard was making for a crack, its legs scrabbling, its arachnid brain no doubt having a laugh at Roth's expense. Roth brought a boot down on the spider, grinding it into the grain of the wood, sending its soul to spider hell, where hopefully God fed them nothing but DDT.
'Sorry, love,' he said to Lilith. 'Hope that didn't upset you.'
The smile flitted across the thin lips, fast as insects. 'You didn't kill it. You delivered it.'
'What's that?'
'Living things never die, they just move on through deeper tunnels of the soul.'
'Er, righty right.'
'Now, if you'll excuse me, Miss Mamie will be wondering where I've gotten off to. I can't stay away from the house for long.'
She walked past him, and he took a whiff of her fragrance. He liked that sort of thing, collected their scents the way some blokes collected phone numbers or underwear. This one smelled a bit like earth, ripe and lush. Fertile and moist. He could dig it, all right.
She stopped at the end of the bridge. 'I'll see you later, then.'
