“Death was there, was she?” Sikras cringed as he eased into a nearby chair. “I’ll be hearing from her soon, I’m sure. She hates it when I mess with her garden.”
“I like Death,” Benjamin said, shrugging. “I think she’s nice. And thatbody. Yes, sir.”
Sikras arched a brow. “How would you know? You can’t even see her. Or hear her.”
“Well, no, but she’s always asking about me. I think the Grim Reaper has a little crush on ole Benjamin Reese.”
“And why wouldn’t she?” Regarding the woman, Sikras smirked. “Just look at Benjamin’s face. Flawless, isn’t it?”
Oblivious to their banter, it seemed the only motion she could manage was to shake her head. “So, that’s it? Married to that miserable, wretched man for twenty years, barely enjoying a day of life, and now I don’t even get to enjoy death?”
Sikras recognized the devastation in every tortured decibel of her breaking voice; he had heard it countless times. Placing his hand atop hers, he offered what he hoped was a gentle smile. “What’s your name?”
She sniffled. “Canida, sir.”
“Canida. Let me be the first to welcome you back, however briefly it may be.” He gave her hand an affectionate, platonic squeeze. “As I tried to explain to your husband before he so valiantly ran off, you’ll only be yourself for as long as your brain is, shall we say, viable? Once the decay sets in and the integrity of your synapses fades, I’m sorry to say, you’ll just be a thoughtless, walking corpse.”
The weight of the confession, however tender in its delivery, sparked sadness that showed in her sagging posture. “I see.”
“Not the news you were hoping for, I’m sure. Your husband may not be here to enjoy your final hours, but Benjamin and I make terrific company when we’re the only option. Can I get you a drink? Wine? Mead? Whiskey? I can’t promise you’ll feel the effects of inebriation, given your body’s condition, but I hear it’s cathartic just to go through the motions.”
Silence followed, the eerie quiet of a woman coming to terms with her death, her reanimation, her husband’s betrayal, and her impending second death. Her posture straightened as she drew a cavernous breath and released it in a slow exhale. “A drink sounds lovely.”
“On it.” Benjamin dipped into a side room, and, before long, he reappeared with a frosted green bottle and a single glass. “For you, milady.”
A weak smile graced Canida’s dry, cracked lips. “Such a gentleman. Thank you.”
“Anything for our honored guest,” Benjamin said.
Disregarding the glass, Canida seized the bottle and chugged it, liquor sailing down her throat in one swift gulp. When the amber liquid leaked through the hole in her stomach lining and soaked into the chair’s padding, she gasped. “Oh, dear. I’m sorry. I—”
Sikras dismissed her apology with a nonchalant wave. “Trust me, that’s not the worst thing that chair has seen in its lifetime.”
A short but genuine laugh lifted some of her dismay, and she jiggled the bottle. “Join me in a drink?”
“No thank you. I don’t drink.”
“In these shit times? Mercy, how do you cope?”
“Gallows humor and a mountain of denial have worked out pretty well so far.”
“More for me, then.” Canida took another drink and let her head collapse into the chair’s tall back. She stared at the ornamental ceiling, lips pursed. “He was a shit husband, you know.”
Sikras chuckled. “He didn’t make a good first impression, but, to his credit, he did haul your corpse all the way here. Surely he had some redeeming qualities.”
“Oh, yes,” Canida mumbled. “And he was more than willing to share them with the local florist, the baker, and Adalin only knows who else. That’s why this whole thing is so damned confusing. Why beg a bloody necromancer to bring me back when he barely acted like he wanted me in the first place? I’ll bet you that organ I dropped that he only wanted me alive because my parents send us silver every month to offset the burdens of living.”
Pretending not to feel the weight of Bilsby’s gold weighing down his pocket, Sikras shrugged. “Money is a wicked motivator, isn’t it?”
“I suppose.” Canida sighed. “Doesn’t matter much now, does it? It’s a wild thing how fast life goes. I lived a fair one though. If I had any regrets at all, it’d be that I never got even for that bastard’s infidelity.”
“Oh?” Sikras arched a brow. “A little revenge would make you feel better, would it?”
Bottle in hand, Canida leaned forward, elbows on her legs. “I’ve been a patient, understanding woman my entire life. Adalin knows he didn’t deserve it. Does it make me a bad person to crave pettiness just this once?”
Sikras shook his head. “Not at all. Just to be sure, is this one of those statements you really mean or one of those things you say aloud just for the satisfaction of saying it?”
“Honey, if it meant getting back at Bilsby, I’d let the entire Red Sentinel have their way with me. And after? I’d sleep like a kitten curled up by a fire.” A flash of mischievousness sparked through the heaviness in her eyes. “What do you say? You raise the dead, but how about you raise my hopes and help out a dying woman?”
