With a jolt, I yanked myself out of the death vision, and nausea twisted my stomach into knots. For a few moments, I swayed unsteadily on my feet, but I quickly regained my balance and composure. As Isu had said, this was getting easier the more I did it.
“Your husband died on the shitter,” I said, “from a heart attack. He was suffering from bad constipation. And here’s a little detail to confirm that I’m not just making this up: his saber, with an ornate ivory hilt, was in the privy with him when his body was found.”
Millicent gasped, her mouth hanging open with disbelief. “You, you really are the God of Death.”
“Yeah. Now, why the fuck do you have this poor asshole’s skull with you? Cheating on him with the gardener? No wonder he was pissed.”
She blushed. “Well, that’s the reason I was conned. My husband died with anger in his heart, as you just saw. Anger at me, for the stupid thing I did. I desperately wanted his forgiveness, so a few years after his death, I sought out a well-known medium who claimed she could communicate with the dead. She said she’d need his skull—and a hefty fee—to communicate with his spirit. So, I had his skeleton exhumed, got the skull, paid her the gold, and she turned out to be a fraud.”
“I see. Well, as you’ve just seen, I’m no fraud. I’m the real deal, and if the favor you’re after is talking to your dead husband, I can do it, in exchange for the item I want.”
I doubted I could actually speak to her husband, or even contact him at all, but I was a very good imitator. I figured I could just pretend to have her husband speak through me.
“The item you want—it’s Lucielle’s Beauty Mirror, isn’t it?” she asked.
“How did you know?”
“It’s the only magical item I own, and what else would the God of Death want from me?”
“That’s right. I want the mirror. You don’t seem too sad about losing it, though.”
“I grow weary of having to use it.” She sighed. “Although I have enjoyed rubbing my possession of it in the face of my rival, but even that has lost its appeal.”
“What have you been using it for?” I asked. Even though I already knew the answer to this question, I wanted to hear it from her lips.
“Well,” she answered, looking away quickly, a blush darkening her cheeks, “as you may have seen from, uh, what you encountered in my husband’s memory, I have, uh, a liking for, well, young men. Young, strong, muscular, hot-blooded, virile men. Handsome men, who burn with desire. Mmm, yes, it is a weakness of mine, but one that I no longer feel particularly guilty about indulging.”
“And you haven’t been using it to steal customers from your business rival?”
She sighed. “Ah, you truly are a god, for it seems that I cannot keep anything secret from you. Yes, I have been using it for that as well, a fact I am more embarrassed to admit than the previous one.”
“Well if you promise not to mess with Anna’s business any more, I can help you out with your first vice.”
“Anna? You know my rival?”
“I’m a god, remember,” I said. “I know everything and everyone.”
“Ah, I see,” Millicent said, obviously smitten by the presence of the divine in her bed chamber.
“Why does a woman as attractive as yourself need a magic mirror to dupe young men into sleeping with you?” I asked. “Surely, plenty of young guys with hot blood and an itch in their pants are lining up to see you?”
“It’s not the getting them into my bed part that’s difficult,” she admitted. “It’s getting them to come back for a second time.”
This conversation was taking some strange turns, but, to be honest, I didn’t really mind. Millicent was older than any woman I’d ever been with, but hell, I wasn’t blind. She looked more like a gorgeous 30-something-year-old than a middle-aged widow and talking to her about sex was kind of turning me on.
“No offense,” I said, “but if a young buck doesn’t want to come back for seconds, and this is a regular pattern, you’re doing something wrong. If you want me to help you out with this, you’re going to have to be prepared to answer some pretty embarrassing questions. If not, well, I’ll just put you in contact with your dead husband for a minute or two, take the mirror, and get out of here. It’s up to you.”
“Let me talk to my husband first,” she said. “Then, I’ll answer your questions.”
“Very well.”
I tried to sound as confident as I could, as if I’d done this a million times before. In truth, I was just trying to remember how the husband spoke so I could perform a somewhat accurate imitation.
For effect, I placed Grave Oath on my right palm and placed my left on the dead man’s skull. I was expecting to see the memory of his death again, but when a buzz of energy zipping through me, the dagger spun in wild circles on my palm for a few seconds, prompting a gasp of fright from Millicent, before it abruptly jumped upright, the point of the blade aimed skyward.
Well, that was strange. I ignored it and closed my eyes again. Before I could begin to speak with my poor mimicry of the dead husband’s voice, a surge of energy rushed through me. It was followed by a lurching sensation,
