Lyssia Read online

was the fate of the dead, even the undead, and she had to know it was true. I had linked with many acolytes throughout the centuries. Most of them saw the world of the living as I did, as an obsolete phase of our eternal lives that was replaced with undeath, which would then too be discarded when the next phase began.

  The divide, the veil of death, opened a completely different realm of existence. Most of us saw the previous life as a chrysalis for unlife, one in which we lived for a time to experience what we had to until we moved on. Some of us, like Lyssia, held the two worlds too close together. If she wasn’t careful, she could be driven mad by it, though that was not something I could simply explain through words.

  Lyssia walked away from that house, back through the streets and past the fountain. The children had stopped playing and the workers had all gone home in the late afternoon. The setting sun and the coming cool air brought scents of dinner meals wafting down from open windows.

  Lyssia went to the inn at the edge of town and bought a room for the night. She went upstairs to be alone while the tavern below began to bustle with patrons of the evening. She closed her door, but didn’t light a lantern. Her undead sight would be enough for her to see.

  She took off her robes and laid them neatly on the bed, then unclasped the belt of daggers from her chest. They clacked together as Lyssia placed them on the wooden dresser. She went to the bed and sat, staring down at her dry hands bound in enchanted mummy wrappings.

  If only I could touch them one more time. I can’t believe it’s over, that this is it. This is what I came here for, just, knowing that they’ve moved on.

  “Is that not enough?” I asked.

  I know it should be, but it doesn’t feel like it. What scares me most is wondering if I can carry on now, after seeing them.

  “Do you really wish to end your unlife?”

  I don’t know, master. Does the pain go away?

  “I’ve never been in your state, nor have any of my subjects, so I don’t know. But from my experience, yes, the pain does go away. In a hundred years’ time, all connection to the living world will be gone.”

  Really? A hundred years?

  “Sometimes more, sometimes less. Just as they have moved on from you, you must move on from them. They have already experienced their pain.”

  So this is normal?

  “I expect so.”

  Lyssia stood from the bed and looked down at the belt of daggers. That means there’s no point in staying here.

  “Come back and heal.”

  There’s something I want to do first before I leave. I just want to see them one more time. Will that be alright?

  “I trust you, Lyssia. Do what you must.”

  Thank you, master.

  Lyssia left her traveler’s robe and the belt of daggers, and went to the window. She opened it with the silence of an assassin and jumped up to the roof. The tapestries that hung over the streets hid her from view as she leapt from building to building while the vision of the undead ensured that she would see any living person before they saw her.

  She landed on the roof of her home without making a sound, but her stance wavered when she saw the flowers around her.

  The rare plants that Johan had bought for her were still healthy and well cared for. Not one leaf held a brown spot of decay or sickness.

  Underneath them, through the floor, yellow and blue auras drifted within the house.

  The vibrant little aura of Arini was quieting down in her bed while Jenna, with an aura older but strikingly similar, tucked her in. Once Arini had tired enough to stay still, Jenna went to the bed next to her and lay down for the night. Lyssia waited as Johan and his wife were soon to follow.

  The moments of waiting were trivial for the undead assassin. She could kneel there all night while she guarded them from above, keeping them secure with her watch. She would never get tired or hungry.

  Time passed differently for us.

  But she didn’t come here to be their bodyguard. Once Lyssia was sure they were all asleep, she moved to Arini and Jenna’s window. The girls didn’t stir as Lyssia slipped inside their room, bringing with her the cool desert breeze.

  Lyssia crept to the side of Arini’s bed, all the while staring at the little girl, becoming more amazed at how she’d grown.

  I remember when I could hold her in my hands, Lyssia thought. She looked at her hands wrapped in off-white cloth that covered the grey skin underneath.

  I don’t know if I should touch her, she thought. The little girl heaved a sigh from the depths of sleep. I’ve come too far to stop now.

  Lyssia’s long, skeletal fingers brushed back the hair from Arini’s face, then caressed the girl’s warm, pink cheeks.

  “I’ll take your pain and make it mine, so you won’t shed a tear. I’ll love you till the end of time, even when death draws near,” Lyssia said as she held the little girl’s hand. “I never got to tell you that, my sweet little girl. I’ll… check up on you, from time to time, when I can. I’ll be there, even if you don’t know it. I’ll never forget you, even if you don’t know who I…” She stopped herself and pulled her hand away.

  “Don’t push yourself,” I said.

  I know, I’ll finish, she thought to me. She leaned over her daughter and pressed her lips to Arini’s head, and felt the warmth move up into her undead body. The girl shivered as Lyssia pulled away.

  Lyssia went to the other bed to see her older daughter. She was struck by how much the girl’s face had changed. The new contours of her jaw hinted at the beautiful woman she would become.

  Johan is going to have his hands full, Lyssia thought, with her, and the boys, and all the other families who want her as their daughter. She tried to hold back her sorrow when she thought of missing her girl’s marriage and wedding. At best, she could don the merchant’s robes again and return to Eton Oasis for Jenna’s ceremony, but even then, at best, she could only look from afar.

  “I pray that your new mother will be there for you, Jenna, and shape you into a wonderful woman,” Lyssia said. “I’ll be back to check on the family as much as I can. Just know that I love you.” She kissed her daughter’s head.

  “Do you think it’s wise to return here?” I asked.

  We’ll see.

  “I understand.”

  Wait. Lyssia backed to the wall, trying to cloak herself in shadows. She could sense someone moving in Johan’s room. Their aura glowed like a ghost behind the brown clay walls as they went to another aura still lying in bed. There was the squeak of a door down the hall. Footsteps grew louder as they approached, then quieter as they moved down to the lower floors. Another muffled squeak and the shutting of a door followed, and they were gone. Lyssia could only sense three people in the house now, all still sleeping.

  She crept into hall and down towards the half-open door. Quick glances around the room revealed nothing suspicious inside – just Johan sleeping alone in bed.

  Where’d she go? Lyssia thought. She went to Johan’s side and stood over him, gazing down at him as feelings of joy came over her.

  He looks exactly the same as I remember. I love that chin, and his eyes. Everyone thought I was older than him because of his young face. She noticed the vacant space in the bed beside him and wanted nothing more than to be there, to hold his body against hers. I shouldn’t, she thought. No one wants to sleep with a corpse…

  She leaned in and kissed his forehead. His scent brought on a surge of memories back from a time before Jenna was born, when they had no obligations but to each other, when, for those few precious months, life was solely about them.

  As she moved down to his lips, something made her stop: a familiar odor that came with the assassin’s trade. She leaned in closer and smelled Johan’s breath.

  I smell nightleaf. Why do I smell nightleaf? She went to an empty cup next to the bed, one which once held the scent of tea with the fumes nightleaf. Lyssia had used the plant many times throughout her work to put her targets, or their bodyguards, int
o a deep sleep. Nothing could wake them until the morning sun washed the effect away, and it was almost undetectable… almost.

  Something isn’t right. You don’t use nightleaf to fall asleep normally, and I don’t remember Johan having problems sleeping.

  She went to the window and looked outside. The woman was already too far out of sight. Lyssia was about to jump down and follow her, but she stopped. She returned to Johan’s bedside. Their lips met for one last kiss.

  “Don’t forget about me, okay?” she said, knowing that he would never hear her through the nightleaf. “I love you. I’ll keep loving you.”

  Without looking back, she went to the window and dropped to the streets below. There wasn’t anyone out of their home that night. The few glowing specters of living auras had found their resting places behind the walls of the clay buildings, and the woman’s tracks were all too easy to spot for an assassin who had followed far stealthier targets.

  Lyssia knew there were few places in town to run off to, and with the tracks as her guide, she began to narrow down where the woman could go. It wasn’t the tavern or any house in the residential district. The woman’s steps were spaced too far for a casual walk, yet too close for a run. Wherever she was going, she was in a hurry to get there, but not so much as to wear herself out or call attention to it. Judging from the straightforward path, the woman knew where to go.

  Lyssia stopped when she saw them leading to the garrison at the edge of the town. Why here? she wondered. Of all the