Isla, Formerly Reformed Necromancer

"Dmitri's in his coffin upstairs, sleeping like the dead, of course. Even has a lipstick smear on his cheek from a presumable bedtime kiss," Greg said, grunting as he collapsed against the wall of the mausoleum beside me. "Here, let me have a puff."

I passed him my lit smoke and dug another crumpled one from the inner pocket of my robe. While my ankle was, of course, warm from the stupid and obviously defective anklet, my hands were cold. Even with what was left of Greg's coat draped over my shoulders. I couldn't quite get the lighter to catch. Greg, ever the gentleman, gingerly took the device from my hands and did it for me. I pursed the cigarette between my lips. His hands, cool and careful, cupped my chin to protect the flame from the blizzard outside.

Blew smoke in his face once it was lit.

We sat, backs against the stone wall, exhausted and sucking on our cigs—Greg's eyes fluttered closed in something akin to bliss after his first exhale and my chest heaved—in silence. It wasn't comfortable. But it wasn't quite awkward either. We were in some kind of in-between state. Limbo. An undercurrent of unspoken anger and hurt still swam beneath the floods of relief and camaraderie and adrenaline coursing through us both.

Grumpkin and, uh, Grumpkin, curled up in our respective laps. The cat formed from his front half, who I suspected was Grumpkin Prime, purred loudly as he made biscuits on my thighs. I scratched behind his ears. Soft and fluffy and whole.

The second Grumpkin swished his tail against Greg's stomach. The fluff seemed to tickle his enticingly exposed patch of belly through that ripped shirt. Watching my vampire rub a knuckle under the cat's chin warmed my center.

Every few seconds, our silence would be punctuated by Mrs. Cabroni's labored breathing. Her bleeding had stopped. Thanks to Greg. His spit and his quick bandaging her up with supplies he found in the house.

"So, let me get this straight," he eventually drawled, cigarette perched between his lips and hair hanging over his eyes in a way that made my stomach flip. "All this hooey was because Rosemond, whose soul you accidentally trapped in Lily Perez's body whilst trying to resurrect the gal, sought vengeance on ole Dmitri for not turning her, but wanted to use necromancy to magic her aforementioned soul back into her original body, restored to full health, first?"

"Basically."

"And she recruited Lily's werewolf boyfriend—the boyfriend who, seemingly accidentally, murdered Lily—as an accomplice by promising to return Lily's spirit to her rightful body in the process?"

"Yep."

"And she killed both Taylor and Sloane's bloodbag for some spooky-wooky necromantic spell ingredients, but it didn't take?"

"Essentially."

Greg glanced at me. "What the hell does it take?"

"A strong stomach."

"Huh. And Rosemond did all this, instead of just staking Dmitri outright, for... the drama?"

"Something like that."

Greg ran a hand through his hair and whistled. "They really were fanging perfect for each other."

I chuckled – oh balls that hurt my head.

"And she's gone, now, right?" he tensed, risking an uncomfortable glance up at the decaying pile of Rosemond's original bones. "For good?"

Ashed my cigarette in the direction of the blood drenched graveyard. "Eh, any moment now."

"Should we do something, or...?"

Greg tried to follow my gaze, but couldn't, and wound up just staring into the wrong corner of the yard.

"Nah, the ladies got it covered."

The real Rosemond, her ghost, no longer hiding in shadows or somebody else's meat suit, was a ginger. Her wild red hair flowed elegantly past her waist. Skin was paler than Greg's. Red lips. Gray eyes. Ears, wrists, neck, and fingers all loaded with heavy jewels. The ballgown in which her spirit was eternally decked in was ornate and lacy and currently clutched in the fists of three angry ghosts.

Rosemond was screaming as the spirits of three other women hooked their fingers into the folds of her gown. Pearl in her flapper dress. Rusti with her afro and bell bottoms. Mousy Agatha with a button nose and a tight bodice.

"Whores! Wenches! Unhand me you desperate, manstealing, sluts!"

"Cunt," said Agatha, stuffing a torn bit of lace from the dress into Rosemond's profane mouth.

Each of them giggled, grins cracked wide and eyes gleaming, as they hauled Rosemond's dusty ass into an awaiting shadow. The inky black spread and wrapped itself around the ghosts, welcoming all four women like a lover with open arms.

Pearl winked at me from across the yard.

The darkness swallowed them, vanishing with a pop.

"Yeah, all clear. She's done-zo now."

I puffed on my cigarette. The nicotine hit good. Clouded my lungs and soothed my jittery my nerves. Of course, it didn't help my agonizing headache. Nor could it stop my shivering. I was freezing my tits off out here.

Clearly noticing my chills, I'd hoped Greg would have scooted closer.

He didn't.

Pixie dust. He really was pissed at me. But we kissed... Oh damn Greg and I kissed. I fucking kissed him and Greg so sweetly closed his eyes and my tongue caught that agonizingly pretty moan in his mouth and that spell worked. Like the vamp was a heckin' surge protector! Oh shit oh wow this was new for me. But, ah, yeah guess I could unpack the consequences of that magic later.

Right now I had to still deal with the consequences of pissing off Greg.

I mean, yeah, he had every right to be mad at me. Don't you even try and fool yourself into thinking you were the more righteous one here, girlfriend. This was all your fault.

Well, and, like, a decent chunk of it was Rocco's fault. The chunk missing from Lily's abdomen. But, nuance, I guess.

Magistrate wasn't going to care about that half of the story anyway.

I sucked in a deep, shaky, painful, tobacco laced breath. Okay. Let's get the hard part over with, shall we? Taking out a vengeful sentient zombie was a cakewalk compared to this.

"I'm a fuck up," I sniffled, oh shit, was I crying? Hard to tell. Every bit of my face already felt either bruised or numb. Least I could blame the tears on the pain, if questioned. "You were right about me. I'm selfish. I don't think things through. I didn't really care about Lily, but, I—"

Cautiously, so as not to pop a blood vessel or break my heart, I turned to look at Greg. He sat, fiddling with his cigarette and gazing out at the gathering snow as well. After a moment, he tilted his head slightly toward me. His blue eyes looked tired. And sad.

"But I do care about you," I whispered, the words tearing my throat as they clawed their way out. "It wasn't right. What I did to you. And I—I didn't mean for it to happen. I didn't even know, you know, this," I gestured between his teeth and the reopened slice on my arm, referring to that string that had appeared between us, "was a thing. That it was possible. So, like, I didn't trick you or anything. Not on purpose at least. That was as much a surprise to me—"

Greg tightened his jaw till it clicked.

"Right, um, the point is I abused my power. On you. For selfish reasons. And that was a real shitty move on my part. My b," my voice quivered as I exhaled. "And I'm sorry. Deeply sorry. Elbows deep in a unicorn's rainbow asshole sorry"—(he snickered)—"And I understand if you want to tell me to fang off or jump into a sinkhole or something. Not that I'm telling you what to do! Just, giving you the option."

After a long moment of just staring at me squirming and failing to hide my gross tears, Greg sighed.

"You'd be a menace on the poor lizard folk living under the city, so, no, don't think I will toss you down a sinkhole," he said softly. "I'm sorry too. For some things I said. I, uh, wasn't thinking straight. I know you didn't intend to trap me"—(I winced)— "but that's part of the problem, isn't it? You don't even know what you're capable of."

"I know now. A bit more, at least."

"And now that you do, never command me to do anything again, Isla," Greg's voice was hard and gravelly. It was the most serious tone I'd ever heard on him and it made me want to jump in an open grave. "I've got... history. One I'm trying very hard not to associate with you."

"Thank you."

His gaze finally, finally snapped to me. "What?"

"'Again' implies you're still willing to write me in prison," I said, incapable of letting the somber moment simmer.

We shifted. Our knees kissed in the tight space. I reached out and gently placed a hand on his leg.

He carefully shifted to take back his leg.

I curled my abandoned hand against Grumpkin's fur to hide the fact that it was shaking.

"And I'm mad at you still, so don't let this next bit go to that pretty head of yours—"

"Pretty swollen."

Greg scooped a handful of snow gathering on the steps of mausoleum and slapped it against my forehead.

"Hey!" I brushed clumps of snow out of my hair. "Seriously, Greg, you should have warned me."

"Oh?"

"That hanging out with you would also get me hit in the face a lot."

He grinned. Lopsided and sweet.

"Don't you pin all your sucker punches on me, but, as I was saying," the vamp sallied forth, "that was pretty brilliant, how you took her out."

The blush rose hot and fast on my chest and cheeks. I scratched Grumpkin a little more vigorously to keep my hands from doing any more stupid stuff, like, you know, sweeping that lock of hair out of Greg's eyes or tracing the pattern of his lips. Which I definitely wouldn't do because I wasn't the one falling in love.

I wasn't.

I cared. That wasn't the same. It was too soon. We barely knew each other. Lay off it! Jeez.

He trilled a complaint for my manhandling him. Grumpkin. Not Greg.

"Thanks."

"I did you know that would work?" Greg asked that with something close to awe in his voice. A smile crinkled the corners of his eyes and mouth. "Be honest."

Yikes.

I chewed on my cigarette. "No. I was just thinking, I don't know, how stupid it would be if you got killed by a zombie who didn't even like cats. Who doesn't like cats? You like cats. Muttered it a whole bunch that time you went wonky from blood loss, which reminded of Big Tony, and how I'd been thinking about getting a chicken for Grumpkin lately, you know?"

Greg stared at me, wide-eyed and unblinking. All trace of that smile vanished.

"Yeah, I think part of that may have been the head injury," I said.

The vamp nodded. "Your mind is fascinating."

He lifted his hand. Reached up, as if to caress my head wound, but halfway through the motion he bit his lip and gave up, instead burying that hand in Grumpkin Part Deux Electric Boogaloo's fur. The cat swatted at him.

"Oh fangs, we should get you," Greg nodded at the barely alive werewolf, "and her to the hospital."

I kicked my leg into the air. Startled Grumpkin, who dug his claws sharply into my thighs, but whatever. Flexed my ankle, waving my court appointed jewelry around. A gust of wind blew snow into the mausoleum. The flakes that landed on my anklet melted immediately under the heat.

"Contraband Curse, remember?" I groaned. "Corpses happen to be my Contraband. Magistrate's already on their way. Probably."

"Running a bit slow, aren't they?"

If it were summer, the crickets would've chirped here for effect. Instead, the blistery winter winds howled and a bit more snow drifted across the headstones.

I shrugged.

"What you do to earn that," Greg asked, pointing at the anklet. Nope. Too far, vampy boy. I shook my head and he groaned, flicking his cigarette out into the snowy yard. "Come on, darling, the least you owe is an explanation."

Darling. He called me darling. He was still mad at me, but he called me darling. The word, the gentle, playful way it trickled off his tongue, it made my insides all warm and gooey. Those pesky moths took flight again, fluttering like mad in my guts, tickling my ribs.

Those eyes got me. So pretty and pleading. Hopeful. Twinkling like the freckles on his cheeks. After only such a short while in the daylight, in the overcast daylight, the little spots were already darkening on his nose and cheeks.

Here it goes. "I took a zombie to prom."

"Yeah, but," Greg's pretty eyes narrowed. "There's more to it than that."

"That's all and your history are getting."

His shoulders sagged. "Guess that makes us even."

The moths' wings stuttered and died. They collapsed, sloshing and drowning in the pit of my stomach. I don't think this nausea was the concussion. Felt like I'd failed a test, to be honest.

I opened my mouth. Probably was just going to say something stupid, but we were both distracted by a distant cackling overhead. A clear as day witch's laugh. Together, Greg and I peeked out from our hiding place. Orange lanterns flickered in the distance, faint through the haze of the snow. Magistrate witches, approaching fast.

"I'll be damned," Greg grumbled.

"I probably already am," I said.

He tapped his nose and his shoulders bounced from his stifled chuckle.

It was cute.

Sucked like a troll's dick stuck in a vacuum cleaner I probably wasn't ever going to hear him do it again.

"Well, here comes my ride," I said, voice shaking only just a little. A smidgy bit. Barely noticeable. "Hey, uh, if you don't want to be caught out past your bedtime, with me, I get it. You can bounce. I won't tell anyone you were here. Swear it."

Greg nodded. He raised a hand over his eyes and squinted, clearly still not used to the sun. "Will I, you know, conk out if I leave?"

Balls.

I covered my face. Felt nice, for a moment, the frigid press of my hands against my battered face. "I don't know," I moaned between my fingers. "I'm sorry, I don't know. This is all new to me. I'll find a way to fix it, I promise, Greg. ... Greg?"

Gently, I slid my hands down my cheeks.

Two gray-eyed, mewling cats stared up at me, whiskers twitching.

But the vampire was gone.

And my gut felt like it been hollowed out by a melon baller.