Sean Traver - Graves' end

Tom found the notion delightful.

He turned around, listening to the sounds of music and laughter that floated to him from the neighborhoods nearest the Yard. Everyone who ever died was out there, somewhere, looking for their loved ones.

Tom took a small skull molded from bright white sugar crystals out of his pocket and paused to examine it, striking what must have looked like an alas-poor-Yorick pose, with the little calavera resting on his palm and peering back up at him.

The name written across its forehead was Dulce .

Black Tom set off to find her amongst all of the liberated dead, grinning his amiable grin as he followed the sound of their distant, happy voices and swinging the walking stick he had no real need to lean on anymore, but still enjoyed carrying.

Neither the bodies of the dead nor the handcuffed hoodlums were anywhere to be seen inside the Yard, Lia noted, experiencing twin pangs of relief and remorse when she made the observation. They’d been swept under the rug already, through the auspices of the LA Blackdogs.

Blackdog operations were always kept secret, whatever occurred, so Lia knew there would be no inquiries or repercussions over the death of Ben Leonard… beyond those her own guilt might devise.

Hannah’s hydroponics shed was still ringed with dimming grow lights when Lia and Dexter walked up to it. Nyx still whimpered pitiably within.

Lia stepped into the ring of high-intensity lamps and went around to the back of the little outbuilding, to find its circuit breaker. Dex followed.

“Are you ready, Dexter?” she asked.

“Ready for night to fall on the day of the dead? Yeah, brujachica. I suppose I am.”

Lia killed the power to the shed.

There was a moment of silence… and then a column of starry darkness blew off the hydro shack’s roof as it shot for the sky. It dripped liquid night down the sides of the atmosphere’s vast blue dome, all the way to the horizons.

The bright, distant sounds of laughter and music faded away to be replaced by the peaceful and soothing noises of evening at Potter’s Yard, of crickets and sprinklers and leaves whispering their secrets to the wind.

They were some of Lia’s favorite sounds in all the worlds.

“Y’know, I spent a little time on a farm as a kid,” Dex said softly, in deference to the stillness that now enveloped them. “Soybeans and corn, mainly, out near Riverside. That wasn’t the worst of times for me. Not the worst at all.”

“Then I hope you’ll stay here, Dexter,” Lia said, squeezing his hand and looking up at him with those large, dark eyes that he adored. “Stay for as long as the times are good.”

Dex smiled. “May they never be any other way, little witch,” he said, and Lia knew that he meant it all the way down to the bone. “May they never be any other way.”

They embraced in the darkness and the quiet, tenderly.

After a time, the witchgirl took the former dead man’s hand and led him away, through the shadows and the trees, to her little home sunk deep beneath the nourishing earth.

San Diego, California. All Souls’ Day, 1949.

Young Captain Normoyle woke with a start in his bed, just before dawn. Annie, his pretty wife, slumbered on beside him, beneath crisp white sheets.

At the foot of the bed stood Ingrid, in her most regal robes; and Hannah, looking smart in a tailored suit. They each glowed with their own inner light, while Ingrid’s wrap and fox-colored hair billowed in a wind that wasn’t otherwise there.

“Hear me, Davey Normoyle,” she said, raising a pale hand as she pronounced: “I am Mictlancihuatl, Queen of the Shades, once called Ingrid, now called Dona Catrina, la Dama Muerte, the Lady Death. This, my Prime Minister, is Hannah Potter. And we-”

Hannah handed Ingrid a Zippo lighter. The Queen held it up. The gold United States Navy insignia on its silver case was clearly visible, even in the bedroom’s nighttime gloom.

“We have a task for you .”