Danse Macabre

Most of the blisters had burst, so that my palm and fingers were a mass of ruptured skin and clear fluid. But the glint of gold in my palm was buried in­side the mass of torn flesh. The cross had melted into my hand.

I looked away then; I didn't want to think about what was going to be needed to clean it up.

Nathaniel leaned over me, blocking my view, which panicked me. I pushed him away, so I could see what Richard was doing by my hand. No way was that cross coming out without medical help. Painkillers, good painkillers, yeah, that was the ticket.

I reached my good hand back up to Nathaniel. He leaned over so I could whisper, "Doctor." I whispered because I was afraid if I talked any louder, I'd start yelling.

He nodded. "Dr. Lillian is on her way."

I nodded. Not caring how the doc was getting into the event. For once in my life, I just wanted the help. Most pain you can ride out, but burns just seem made to eat the world. The pain eats everything else. You can't think about anything but the pain. The grinding, biting, aching, nauseating pain. I'd had burns before, but this one was going to be the worst. Weeks of re­covery, and depending on how deep the cross was embedded, maybe perma­nent damage to the hand. Shit, fucking shit.

Dr. Lillian came into sight. I didn't recognize her at first, and it wasn't just the pain. Makeup had softened her face, brought out what she must have looked like ten years ago. The soft blue of the dress complemented the soft gray of her hair, and the pastel shades of lipstick and eye shadow. I didn't look at her and think, She must have been lovely a decade ago. I looked up at her and thought, She is lovely now.

She shook her head. "What am I going to do with you people tonight?"

I swallowed hard. "Didn't do it on purpose."

She lifted the long skirt enough so she could kneel comfortably. "I would say not." Her face was neutral, pleasant, a good doctor's face. She started to reach for my hand, and I jerked away.

She leaned back, giving me a little smile. "If you promise to do everything I tell you to do, exactly the way I tell you to do it, I'll shoot you up with a painkiller before I touch your hand."

I nodded.

"Your word of honor that you won't argue with me, Anita. That you'll just do what I tell you to do?"

If I hadn't been out of my head with pain, I might have thought harder about her wording, but all I could think about was the pain. I nodded, and whispered, "I promise."

She smiled at me. "Good." She looked behind her. Claudia came into view, kneeling so the other woman could whisper to her. Claudia nodded, stood, and left.

Lillian turned away to get the shot ready. Normally, I made a fuss about needles. I was almost as phobic of needles as I was of flying. But tonight, 1

wasn't complaining. I was too busy fighting off the urge to start screaming, Make it stop, make it stop.

Lillian made Richard move, so she could kneel by my injured hand. Micah cupped my face so I couldn't see the needle. He knew how I felt about them. I let him do it, but I wasn't sure that I'd have cared tonight. I felt the pressure of the needle, then it was as if she shot hot water directly into my veins. I could feel it spreading liquid through my body. It was the oddest sen­sation. I'd never had anything that I could trace through my veins like that. My upper body flushed with heat. Then it was hard to concentrate, and I was dizzy. Even lying flat, I was dizzy. I started to ask if something was wrong, then the pain just washed away. The drugs bathed the inside of my upper body in hot water, and the pain just washed away.

Lillian leaned over me. "How do you feel, Anita?"

I managed a smile, and knew it was probably goofy. "Doesn't hurt now."

"Good," she said, smiling. She looked at Richard. "I think you need to go back to your date, Richard."

He shook his head. "I'm staying here."

"You're Clark Kent tonight, Ulfric, not Superman. You have to go back to your date and pretend you're a mild-ma

Richard glanced at us all. "Are they staying?"

"One of them will be," Lillian said, "but they aren't hiding what they are, Ulfric. The price of hiding is that you must stay hidden. Now, go back be­fore the woman starts to look for you."

He started to argue.

"Don't make me be cruel about this, Ulfric," Lillian said.

"Go," I said, and my voice sounded strange. "Go, Richard, go."

He gave me a look that was full of such conflict, even pain. But tonight I didn't have any time for anyone's pain but mine.

"I'm sorry," he said. I wasn't sure what he was sorry about. That he had to go? That he had another date? That he was still hiding in his Clark Kent disguise? Or, maybe, that it was his cross embedded in my hand. The cross I'd given him for Christmas once. Yeah, that might need a sorry.

48

They spread a tablecloth across me and another under my arm. Appar­ently, Requiem had "charmed" them out of the restaurant staff. He'd kept his eyes averted from me, as if he feared the cross would flare to life.

Lillian had Micah and Nathaniel distract me, though the drugs did a lot of the distracting for them. I was afraid it would hurt, but it was like the fear couldn't hold on to me, or I couldn't hold on to it. Jason pressed down on my arm. I started to protest. Nathaniel kissed me, hard. The kiss swallowed my small noises.

There was a sharp, abrupt tug on my hand. I cried out, and Nathaniel ate the sound as he did sometimes during sex. A scream lost in a kiss.

I could feel them doing something to my hand. Wrapping it in some­thing. Nathaniel drew back from the kiss, his mouth smeared with my lip­stick. He put a finger over my lips, and I fought to make only small whimpering sounds. It wasn't so much that it hurt, it was almost as if my body knew it was hurt, and wanted to react to it. But every time I tried to concentrate on the pain, it just slipped away. Maybe it seemed weird to try to concentrate on it. I guess I was trying to fight the drugs, stupid of me. But I couldn't just slip away. I couldn't not fight, even when it wasn't good for me.

Nathaniel smiled down at me, as if he knew what I was doing. He proba­bly did. He moved his finger back from my mouth. I nodded at him to let him know I understood. We were trying not to attract attention. Sure.

I looked down and found that my hand was wrapped in gauze, like a pris­ tine version of the mummy's hand. I got a flash of fresh blood on the table­cloths before they were bundled up. I tried to care about how we'd explain the fresh blood, but I couldn't finish caring, before it floated away. It should have felt good, to be so relaxed, but I knew that this was a night when Jean-Claude needed me, everyone needed me. The Mother of All Darkness was still out there. What would they do if she came back and I wasn't there? Fear tried to swell again, and it didn't last. I couldn't hold on to any one thought,

or emotion. It was like trying to row a boat in the fog. You knew what di­rection you wanted to go. You'd get a glimpse of the shore, and row your hardest, then the fog slipped back over you, and when it cleared again, the shore was somewhere else. As much as the pain would have distracted me, I'd have been more functional with that than the drugs. But the burn had hurt so much, so very much. I'd wanted it to stop.

Someone picked me up, and it woke me. Though I wasn't sure I'd exactly been asleep, passed out maybe. Nathaniel was carrying me. The sleeves of his white shirt showed, and I was covered by a black tux jacket. His, proba­bly. I was vaguely proud of myself for figuring it out.