Dead Set

  No crying. Nothing. Just be here.

  They sat on the broken carousel without talking, just looking out at the moonlit sand.

  Zoe drifted, halfway between sleep and daydreaming. She was on the mountain overlooking the almond grove and the tree fort behind the house in Danville. Black dogs prowled among the trees, sniffing the air. She wasn’t surprised or even particularly scared to see them. They were a part of her world, both in life and now in her dreams. Every now and then one of them would look up to where she was sitting on the mountain. They know I’m here. They’re waiting for me to come down. They’re not in any rush. They can wait forever. Could she? Half buried in snow, a rusty telescope lay at her feet. Emmett’s telescope. The one he used to watch Valentine and me. She picked it up and looked for their tree fort. It took her a while because she didn’t recognize it at first. The fort was falling apart. Half of it lay on the ground in a heap. What was left looked like scrap lumber that a hurricane had blown into the tree a hundred years ago. The wood was black, pulpy, and rotten, the nails rusted and barely holding what was left of the fort together. Unlike the dogs, that sight scared her. It was all being taken away, the good things in her life and now her dreams, too. And when even her dreams were gone, would there be anything left of her? Finally, the dogs started up the mountainside. They aren’t going to wait, after all, she thought. Zoe set down the telescope and clutched her knees to her chest. She watched the dogs come all the way up the hill.

  There was a sound. Then something moved, brushing against her leg. Beside her on the carousel, her father sat up. He turned his head, looking as confused as she felt. “No, it can’t be,” he said.

  Zoe looked at him, waiting for her head to clear. She’d drifted farther away than she’d meant to and the world was fuzzy around the edges. Her father stood slowly, pulling himself up on a bright yellow sea horse. “Not now,” he said quietly.

  She finally heard it. The rain had stopped and the sound was replaced by the soothing white noise of the ocean. Then slowly, as the world came into focus, there was something else, the animal-like wail of a siren that Zoe knew was calling her father to another feeding.

  “But you just did it,” she said. “You said you’re supposed to rest now. They can’t call you right back. Can they?”

  Her father looked down at her. “It’s never happened before.” He leaned his head on his arms, propped on the sea horse’s back. “I know what this is. It’s Hecate. She wants to trap you and she thinks if she calls me back you’ll follow. You have to leave now. Right now. To hell with the tide. I have to go to the café.” He let go of the sea horse and collapsed onto the carousel platform.

  Zoe scrambled over to him and pulled him upright. “Look at you. You can’t even stand up,” she said. “I’m supposed to watch you walk off and get bled to death?”

  “Neither of us has a choice.”

  She stood and pushed her father back against the carousel pole. She smiled at him. “Listen to me. Don’t go.”

  “I have to. I can’t help myself.”

  “Try. I know what to do. It’s so simple,” she said. She stopped at the edge of the platform. “Stay here. Don’t follow the siren. Fight it. Everything is going to be all right.”

  She jumped down onto the sand. Her father said something as she went, but she couldn’t hear him over the wailing of the siren. Zoe felt good, energized, better than she’d felt since the funeral. For the first time she saw things with total clarity and knew exactly what she had to do. It was so simple. She was a little scared as she fell into step with the souls marching to the café, but she was excited, too. It felt good to be doing something real after having lived so long in a stagnant gray gloom. She wondered if it hurt when you were covered with the snakes. A few had bitten her the last time. The bites stung a little, but it wasn’t that bad. She remembered that Mr. Danvers had said there were bats and snakes with anesthetic in their saliva, so their prey wouldn’t feel their bite. Maybe these snakes were like that. She took a deep breath and let it out, knowing that she’d have the answer soon enough.

  This is was what I should have done the moment I got to Iphigene. It’s what the city wanted—blood and sacrifice—and it would have it. Not a pale ghost version, but the blood of a living person. That should make Hecate happy enough to leave Dad alone.

  She fell into step with the other dazed spirits, jostling and being jostled as she pushed her way to the middle of the throng. She was nervous, but she knew that was all right; normal, even. Zoe let go of everything she’d been clinging to and let herself be swept along by the tide of dead souls.

  In front of her was an older man who was nearly bald. A few bristly sugar-white hairs on the back of his head were pressed flat by a plastic bag pulled tight onto his scalp. Reading upside down, Zoe made out the words WHITE RABBIT and saw a picture of an overly cute bunny. She remembered White Rabbit candies. They sometimes came with the check when her family would go out for dinner in Chinatown. The old man in front of her was using the bag as a makeshift rain hat. Next to him was a girl just a few years older than Zoe. Her head was shaved and she had large Chinese-style dragons tattooed on her scalp above each ear. The dragon on the left was red and the one on the right was blue. Zoe wondered what that meant. She wished she’d met the girl somewhere else so she could ask. She looked like someone who would have been in the club the night her mother and father met.

  The steady sound of the siren soon melted into the background and everything seemed to go very quiet. Zoe’s gaze flickered back and forth between the twin dragons and the cartoon rabbit as she splashed through the silent streets.

  Time was moving in funny ways. A block could shoot by in a second, but passing a single building could take hours. It was the fear, she knew, playing with her head. Zoe closed her eyes and let the crowd guide her with the motion of their bodies. She felt like an overwound guitar string, vibrating at some unnaturally bright and delirious frequency, knowing she could snap at any moment. She hoped they reached the café soon.

  A moment later, the siren stopped, for real this time, leaving the street in unsettling quiet. Zoe opened her eyes. There in front of her was the café. Scared though she was, she smiled to herself, suddenly remembering something her mother had once told her: “Be careful what you wish for.” Without a word, the crowd began filing through the open door. Zoe followed them in.

  Inside, she went to an empty table near the front window. It felt important that she be able to see outside and not be suffocated by the Half Moon Café’s drab walls. The gray street through the window might be dead, but at least it looked a little bit like the world and home.

  Zoe took off her coat slowly. She had to. Her hands felt thick and clumsy, like she was wearing mittens. She took a deep breath, her face filling with heat. She ignored the sensation, refusing to think about it. She didn’t allow any thoughts to form in her mind at all. What she needed to do was to keep her body moving and not think about anything.

  She stood and folded her overcoat, but as she dropped it over the back of her chair, the straight razor clattered to the floor. She grabbed it up and stuffed it into the pocket of her hoodie, hoping that no one had seen it, but it gave her an idea. She checked her pants pockets, and when what she was looking for wasn’t there, she checked the pockets of her coat. Nothing. Valentine’s compass was gone. Somewhere, through all the running and hiding, she’d lost it. It was too bad. It was something of his and something from home. And so she wrapped her fingers around the razor. She needed something to hold on to when it, and it was the only word her mind would permit her at that point, was happening. She unzipped her hoodie and pushed it back, exposing her shoulders and neck. She pushed up her sleeves and rested her hands on the table, waiting.

  Nothing moved outside the window. Everyone was inside. The café was about half full. Zoe turned around in her seat. No one was talking to anyone. Most people were staring off into space, eith
er still under the hypnotic effects of the siren or just wanting not to make eye contact with anyone. Zoe looked around for the man with the White Rabbit bag on his head, but she couldn’t find him. She spotted the girl with the tattoos near the back of the place, under a dusty cuckoo clock. Zoe smiled at her, but the girl turned away.

  Without her wanting it, an image of her mother popped into her head. She wondered where her mother was right now. In a funny way, as far as Zoe was from home, she felt close to her. She’d made her own sacrifice, given up so much, and now here was Zoe about to do the same and she wanted to talk to her mother about it, maybe thank her and maybe get some reassurance that she was doing the right thing. I don’t even know what’s going to happen next. Wish I’d had the chance to say something to her in case I’m not going home.

  “Look at the brave little princess all alone. Where’s Daddy? Did he abandon you again? First in the world above and now here. He’s not a very good daddy, is he?” Zoe knew who was speaking without turning around, though his voice was different now. It was more of a whisper, and he had a slight lisp that turned each s into a hiss.

  Zoe looked up into Emmett’s cold snake eyes. He was a horrible sight—a glistening cobra’s head perched atop a man’s body. His tongue shot out every few seconds to taste the air. Ugly as he was, seeing him now, she wasn’t frightened as she had been the first time she saw him. The awful thing she’d been dreading was happening and was no longer a crippling imaginary terror. As scared as she was, she could hide it. Don’t give him the satisfaction, she thought.

  “I like you better like this,” she said brightly. “It really suits you. All slimy and crawling through sewers, eating shit and rats. Who taught you that? Your mother?” She cocked her head coyly at those final words.

  “My mother is a goddess,” said Emmett.

  “Your mother is a dumb dead bitch!” Zoe said, her voice getting louder with each word.

  Emmett lunged at her. Zoe jumped back, almost knocking over her chair. Emmett grabbed her before she could fall and held her, his warm, wet snake breath in her face.

  “I was going to take you out of here,” he whispered. “But now, princess, you get to bleed. Not die, but you get to bleed like Daddy.”

  Zoe shook herself free and leaned her elbows on the table. She didn’t care about anything at that moment except shouting loud enough for the whole café to hear. “That’s your threat? I get to bleed? That’s why I came here! You can’t threaten people with what they’re already doing, you fucking retarded lizard!”

  Emmett took a step back. Zoe got the feeling that no one had ever yelled at him in such a way before. It felt pretty damned good. The feeling didn’t last long, though. Emmett’s eyes turned upward to the ceiling then back down to meet Zoe’s. “It’s starting.”

  Zoe looked up. It was happening just the way she remembered. A dense black cloud swirled around the ceiling, and as the cloud descended, it broke apart into individual, chittering, batlike snake things. This is it. She closed her eyes. Maybe she could fool Emmett by not letting him see her fear, but she couldn’t fool herself. She took deep breaths and squeezed the razor. Her stomach was full of ice. The chittering grew louder and the light grew dimmer. She braced herself for the first bite.

  Something slammed into the window and someone was shouting, but it didn’t sound like anyone in the café. Zoe opened her eyes and froze. Her father, pale and sweating, his hair plastered to his forehead, was pounding his fists against the window near where Zoe was sitting. He was yelling to her.

  “Zoe! Get out of there!” he screamed.

  Emmett turned and let out an airy little chuckle. “A day late and a dollar short, Dad,” he said.

  “Zoe! Don’t do this!”

  Emmett laughed merrily.

  Then the first snake landed on Zoe’s shoulder and dug its fangs into her neck. The pain was electric. Hot and dizzying, it shot through her, making her whole body shake. A bat landed, and then another. Through the pain, she could hear her father calling her name. Emmett was right beside her. She could hear him laughing.

  Something snapped. The taut string she’d felt like earlier finally frayed and came apart. Before she knew what she was doing, Zoe was on her feet and screaming. She had the razor in her hand and she was slashing at Emmett’s arms. He whirled and backhanded her across the face. She fell back into the table, then ran at him again, screaming and hacking away at his arms and hands, driving the razor into his chest and slashing his face.

  Emmett bellowed, a horrifying, deep-throated roar of pain and fury. But the snakes, which had ignored him until then, were on him. Driven into a feeding frenzy by the scent of his blood, they flew away from Zoe and the others to attack Emmett. An immense, writhing horde of flying snakes forced him to the ground. His hands burst from the ravenous black mass, scattering snakes and reaching for Zoe. She leaped back as Emmett rolled over, crushed under the weight of his starving brothers and sisters.

  Zoe turned and burst out of the café door, running to her father. They held each other while, behind them, the other spirits dashed from the café, scattering down the wet, gray street. When the street was clear, Zoe’s father took off his overcoat, wrapped it around her, and they ran back into the city.

  Eleven

  They went back to his room. Zoe’s father kept his arm around her the whole way, as if a strong wind might carry her off. It felt good. It felt conspiratorial.

  Her father’s coat was big enough that it was easy for her to keep her face hidden behind the collar. She wasn’t sure where they were headed, at first. She was worried that it might be back to the carousel, and was relieved when her father steered them the other way, onto the twisting route to Ouroboros Street. Once they were inside, Zoe limped up two flights of stairs before she realized that her father wasn’t with her. She went back down and found him at the top of the first-floor landing, on his knees and leaning heavily on the wall.

  “Dad?” she asked uncertainly.

  “I’m all right,” he said, blinking up at her. “I just needed to rest a minute.”

  She came down to him. “Let me help you.” They started up the stairs slowly. This time he leaned on her.

  “Look at us. A couple of wrecks.”

  “If Mom could see us now.”

  That made him laugh. They made it up to the fifth floor and Zoe opened the door to his room. Her father collapsed on the bed.

  “You need to rest,” Zoe said.

  “I think you’re right,” he replied. Then he smiled at her weakly. “You saved me back there. Another feeding right then would have finished me.”

  Zoe was looking through the drawers in her father’s unused dresser. She found a couple of worn-looking towels in the bottom drawer and looked up at him as he spoke.

  “You’d have done it for me.” She took the towels and went to the bed. She handed him the larger of the two, tossed his overcoat onto a chair, and used the smaller towel to dry her hair.

  “Of course I’d have done it for you. I’m your father. It’s part of my job description,” he said, unfolding the towel and wiping his face. “But I don’t know that every kid would have done what you did.”

  “ ’Course they would. You would have.”

  “Yeah, right,” he said quietly. He looked away from her, balling the towel in his hands. “I’m not so sure I would have done it for my old man.”

  Zoe looked down at him. She couldn’t believe what she was hearing. Part of her was shocked, but another part felt sad for him. Why would he say something like that? She remembered seeing her father differently just a few days earlier, when she’d put on the Animagraph and seen the world through his eyes. It was the night he’d met her mother. She recalled flutters of drunken excitement when he first laid eyes on her, but the feeling was mixed with others Zoe hadn’t paid attention to at the time. Confusion. Silent, sullen rage. And fear, buried way in
the back of his mind under all the beer. Something that had happened between him and his father that night. His back and arms ached where the belt had hit him, where it always hit.

  Zoe sat down next to him on the bed. He suddenly looked younger to her.

  “Yeah, you would have,” she said. “In the end.”

  “I’d like to think so.” He turned back to her, took her hand, and smiled. “In case I haven’t told you, you’re a pretty good kid. A pain in the ass, but a pretty good kid.”

  “Thanks.”

  “It always cracks me up how much you’re like your mom.”

  Zoe let go of his hand and went back to drying her hair. “Really? How?”

  “No one could ever tell her anything either.” He followed Zoe’s lead and started drying his hair. “Not her parents. Not me. No one. She just did what she thought she had to do. A lot of the time she was right, too.”

  “What about when she wasn’t?”

  He shook his head and set the towel aside. “Craziness. Complete fucking madness. She got us into as much trouble as she got us out of.” He looked at Zoe. “Just like you.”

  Zoe took their wet towels and draped them over the tiny sink in the kitchen area to dry. “I never thought we were much alike.”

  “Believe me, kiddo. You are.”

  “Sounds like a lot of trouble.”

  “It sure as hell is,” he replied. “But you don’t mind. We admire people for the smart things they do, but we love them for their craziness, all the ridiculous little things they do.” He laughed a little to himself. “She used to let the air out of the cops’ tires outside the clubs. She’d pile up all the baby corns and hide them under her napkin whenever we had Chinese food. She’d scream like a banshee whenever she heard Barry Manilow.”

  Zoe laughed, too. “Yeah, I’ve heard her do that.” She walked back over to where her father lay. “It’s just really hard to picture her like that.”